


Harry Potter and the Secrets of Vipers Part 2

by anonymousmagpie



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Dumbledore Bashing, Grey Harry Potter, James Potter Bashing, Manipulative Albus Dumbledore, Multi, Slightly - Freeform, Slytherin Harry Potter, WBWL, Wrong Boy Who Lived, not as slight
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:22:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 76,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24721513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousmagpie/pseuds/anonymousmagpie
Summary: The conclusion of the AO3 work Sarcasm and Slytherin. Chapters 1-16 are available here.https://archiveofourown.org/works/15848610/chapters/36912186This is Sunmoonandstars, back from the dead. Original work summary:Harry Potter returns for his fifth year at Hogwarts amidst an increasingly unstable political situation. And this year, for the first time, Hogwarts is no longer firmly under Albus Dumbledore's control. Threats inside and outside the school put pressure on some of Harry's closest friendships, and power struggles lie beneath the surface of every faction in the brewing conflict. At its center is the Potter family, and Harry's position is more critical, and more precarious, than ever.Happy reading everyone. I have no clue when book 6 is going to be done or ready to post but have at least the end of book 5 because it's been languishing on my hard drive for too long.
Comments: 368
Kudos: 1169





	1. Chapter 15

_Theo_

“Quite an intriguing group of friends.”

Theo slumped in the chair across from his father, exhausted. They’d just spent a brutal hour dueling and he really just wanted to shower. “Thanks.”

Father smirked at him, five times more relaxed than he ever was around anyone who wasn’t family. “Hermione Granger, hm?”

Theo found himself fumbling for words. It was not a familiar sensation and he didn’t like it.

“Did you really think the elves wouldn’t tell me why you took so long to join me in the dueling hall?” Father examined a parchment. Theo recognized the upside-down seal of Borgin and Burkes at the top. “I’ve no objections, so long as she is truly one of ours.”

“She is,” Theo said softly. Hermione didn’t like to talk about it but she sucked at hiding things, and he could tell her relationship with her birth parents had gotten progressively more strained over the last few years. It was unfortunate, but also for the best. Living with one foot in each world was exceedingly difficult and posed a danger to the magical population.

Although Justin seemed to be doing all right. His parents had even met the Malfoys on the platform and managed to win rapport with Narcissa and grudging tolerance from Lucius. Theo had almost tripped on his own feet when he saw the four adults having a civil conversation.

“And then there is Hadrian Black.” Father set the paper aside, his attention snapping into place. _This_ was what he’d wanted to talk about. “You weren’t kidding about his power.”

Theo smirked. “No, I wasn’t.”

The Notts were possessed of the very rare hereditary ability to sense other magicals’ power levels. It was similar to Filius Flitwick’s ability to sense spells and enchantments shot at him, although the general theory was that his gift was from his goblin heritage and the Notts had no creature blood. Theo had been taught Occlumency from a very young age despite the dangers it posed to an unformed mind for the sole purpose of controlling his ability. It could cause headaches and an inability to function in crowds if left unchecked. By the time he was eleven years old and shopping in Diagon Alley, he’d been fully able to turn his sixth sense off and on. So when he had gone to buy a telescope and met a sharp-eyed messy-haired kid in filthy Muggle clothes with as guarded an expression as Theo had seen on any pureblood heir, the first thing he did was feel out the other boy’s magic.

If he hadn’t been looking right at Harry, he’d have thought he was meeting a thirteen- or fourteen-year-old. It had caught Theo’s interest right then, interest than only grew when he learned how malnourished Harry was—malnourishment tended to _stunt_ magical development.

Needless to say, he’d immediately been certain that this was someone to watch.

Harry and his father had met before, but only in crowded environments, or only for brief snatches of time. Their extra sense required proximity, took a few minutes of concentration before it worked with any kind of accuracy, and got diluted by crowds, so Father wouldn’t have been able to gauge it before.

“He’s certainly stronger than his age would indicate,” Father mused. “Stronger than you.”

Theo shrugged. He’d known that from dueling, even though the one quirk of the Nott sense was that he couldn’t turn it on himself. “And the rest of us. Although Daphne and Neville come close.” 

“He’ll one day be one of the foremost wizards in the nation,” Father predicted. “You did well to befriend him.”

“It’s a genuine friendship,” Theo said. “I mean—at first, I was trying to get a sense of him as a rival, but by the time we got to the bookstore I actually liked him.” _And by the time he met me on the train and handed me a herbology book restricted for being Dark, I was sure._

“I know. It was still a clever initial move.” Most people idly toyed with a quill or something when concentrating. Father just got more still the harder he was thinking. Theo had always tried to emulate that habit. Harry sometimes did, but he tended to forget and spin his wand around his fingers. Although sometimes he went for the wand-fiddling on purpose. Theo had always been amazed at how bloody _threatening_ his best friend could make that simple gesture.

“His loyalties?” Father asked finally.

“To himself.”

“The Dark Lord?”

Theo hesitated. “I’m honestly not sure.” Technically, he hadn’t lied. He and Harry had never explicitly talked about this. He couldn’t say for _sure_ where Harry would fall in the war, if the war broke out into open fighting, which was looking increasingly likely. But he was _almost_ sure Harry was at least neutral with sympathy for the objectives of the Dark.

He rubbed a thumb over the ring on his right index finger, silver and set with a single green basilisk scale. Theo might have his suspicions about Harry’s opinions, he might be privy to most of Harry’s plans, but there was only so much of that he was willing to share with his father.

“He’s left that toad alone all year,” Father said, making a face at the thought of Umbridge.

“That’s an insult to toads,” Theo said with a small grin, remembering Neville clutching Trevor protectively.

Father raised an eyebrow.

“Inside joke, sorry. Neville has a toad.”

“Odd choice of pet.”

Theo shrugged one shoulder. “His family thought he was a Squib for the longest time. He got it as a present when he got the Hogwarts letter. Sentimental value. Also I think he likes sticking it to them by keeping such a backhanded gift, even if he won’t admit it.”

Father’s second eyebrow joined his first. “They thought _that boy_ was a _Squib?_ ”

“Idiots,” Theo agreed. It was the main reason he’d never seriously objected to Harry collecting Neville. The kid was a Longbottom but, more importantly, Theo had always been able to feel his potential. He’d been a worthy connection.

Then, somehow, they’d ended up friends. Theo hadn’t been expecting that any more than he’d been expecting to date a Muggle-born but expectations tended to be defied around Harry. 

“Father, what do you know about the Pritchard kids?” he asked suddenly.

Father looked up from another stack of financial reports. “Marcine interns with the Wizengamot. Lucille is five years older than you, works in the DMLE. The younger two are still in school. Why?”

“Graham—the youngest—will be staying at Grimmauld Place from now on,” Theo said. “For… reasons best left alone, for now, but if things escalate—the Blacks would appreciate our support against them.”

“Why did Hadrian and Sirius step in?” Father said slowly.

Theo considered how much he could say. No details, not yet, because the Dark Lord was back and Father was one of his Inner Circle. Harry didn’t want this coming to light yet and the Dark Lord could order Father to use it. But he could hint. “Their childhoods left them with a particular hatred for certain types of parents.”

Father’s hand tightened on his quill until Theo worried it might snap. “You know, I was considering tossing Pritchard a bone in the Wizengamot and letting his proposal on farming regulations through, but now there’s no _way_.”

Theo nodded. For as long as he could remember, Father had taught him about the Wizengamot, its members, and the Notts’ various enemies and allies. Nedwin Pritchard was one of the elected members of the Wizengamot, and a perennial thorn in Father’s side. Not particularly powerful, but he could be counted on to support proposals like the Muggle Protection Act that Father and Lucius were currently keeping bogged down in the research department.

Father considered for a few seconds. “You’ve gone through the blackmail files more recently than I have—what is there on that family?”

“Nothing other than this. Well, and Pritchard’s fondness for this one brothel in Amsterdam, but that’s not illegal, just reputation-damaging. And then not very—it’s a tame brothel.” Theo had actually updated their blackmail files when Pansy passed that bit on to him and Harry a few months ago; she’d dug into all the younger Vipers’ families. “I can go look again, but if they’ve got other skeletons, they’re well hidden.”

Father cursed. “If it comes to it, our faction could push him out of the ‘Gamot entirely, but that might burn favors best spent elsewhere and it’s hard to know who’d replace him. I’ll make some pointed remarks next time I see him. There should be no issues keeping the boy with the Blacks.”

“Thanks.” Theo hesitated. “Will there be a conflict of interests?”

“We’re not moving that strongly in the Wizengamot at this time,” Father said.

In other words, the Dark was keeping a low profile. Convenient. Theo nodded understanding and took the pile of papers Father handed him. Being the sole Heir to a nearly-extinct House came with a bevy of responsibilities, including an intimate awareness of all their assets and financial ventures. At a glance, this looked to be a packet on the progress of the new expanded greenhouses they were testing for increasing crop yields in their southern farms.

“I’d like your thoughts on that over breakfast before I meet our solicitor,” Father said.

“It seems to have been a great investment,” Theo said idly, paging through the stack. “Paid off the price of enchanting the greenhouses in five years.”

“Yes, but the enchantments have to be renewed periodically.”

“Mmm.”

They worked for two hours in companionable silence broken only by the occasional question or comment. Theo had his own study down the hall, but when they dealt with the joint business of the Nott family, he often ended up in here. It was easier.

Finally, Father declared their business finished, and Theo said goodnight and headed off to bed. The manor’s familiar empty stillness surrounded him. 

Sometimes he caught Father drinking in his study, holding a moving photograph of a laughing woman with Theo’s hazel eyes. Sometimes he wondered whether the manor would be different if she’d lived, if laughter and colorful paintings filled the halls instead of simple decorations and silence. Sometimes he wondered how Father could stand to face Dumbledore in the Wizengamot and not kill the fucker.

Theo mentally reviewed his Shit List. Dumbledore, obviously. James Potter and Ethan Thorne, for what they’d done to his best friend. Ben Creed and Libby Borage. Gladys Fenwick, who couldn’t go a year without trying to get Father kicked off the Wizengamot for some ridiculous charge or other. Jules Potter, whose time at school was only _not_ a living hell because Harry still had a soft spot for him and so Theo restrained himself. Andromeda Tonks. The entirety of the Pritchard family, as of a few days ago. Harry’s filthy Muggle relatives. The Montague family, who’d been at loggerheads with the Notts for years, although their only son Vance was now graduated and temporarily out of Theo’s reach.

Nothing to be done about any of them quite yet, but there was a war coming. Things _happened_ in wars.

_Harry_

Harry flipped open the journal with one hand and kept eating with the other. Justin had gone home the previous afternoon, and Hermione was busy with Christmas, and he’d seen most of his friends recently, so this was probably—

_JP_

_Hey—so there was an impromptu meeting at the Burrow last night. We figured you’d be busy. Anyway, after the kids got kicked out, I sneaked around outside and tried to listen at the window with Susan. We couldn’t hear much but they were definitely talking about the Department of Mysteries. I got a peek at a bit of parchment talking about the DoM’s different departments. Time, death, space, love, and thought, apparently? Doesn’t make much sense to me but you read a lot more than I do—could you do some research?_

“What is _that_ evil smile for?” Sirius said.

Harry looked up at him and Graham, who were both looking back with some trepidation. “Let’s just say I went fishing, and may have just gotten a bite,” he said with a smirk.

Graham shook his head. “I don’t even want to know.”

“Probably for the best,” Sirius muttered.

_HB_

_Probably for the best I wasn’t at the meeting—I don’t think most of your Order likes me much. I can definitely look into that for you. I can’t promise much. The DoM is really secretive and most of what they study is almost impossible to understand._

_How are the Weasleys holding up?_

_JP_

_Not well. The twins are a bloody nightmare, locked up in their room all the time blowing things up. Molly cries at the drop of a hat and Ginny snarls at everyone for no reason, and Percy’s locked himself in his room, and Ron just seems kind of… lost. It’s miserable but I’m over here a lot for Ron’s sake. Bill and Charlie came home._

_HB_

_The cursebreaker and the dragon tamer, right?_

_JP_

_Yeah. You’d like Bill, I think. He’s cool. Although now is—probably not the best time._

_HB_

_Molly’s still mad the twins and Ginny came over here, is she?_

_JP_

_Yeah_

_HB_

_She certainly knows how to hold a grudge._

_JP_

_Yeah_

_I sort of don’t blame her_

_But I’m glad you were there for them._

_HB_

_And how are you?_

_You were close with Arthur, right_

_JP_

_He was like an uncle. Or grandfather_

_It’s hard_

_I knew people were going to die. It’s a war, and that’s what happens. But it didn’t feel real until—this. And somehow I didn’t think it would be Arthur._

_HB_

_He didn’t deserve this_

Harry even meant it. Arthur had always been kind and Harry might not love all the Weasleys but neither did he think they deserved to end up casualties of a war that started before Jules came along and complicated it.

_Happy Christmas, Jules_

_JP_

_Thanks_

_Happy Christmas to you too_

Harry shoved the journal away with a slight grimace. So Molly was still pissed. He wished that the price of his decisions wasn’t losing the Weasleys. The Burrow was the second place he’d ever felt at home, and the first family to ever welcome him.

“Boy Who Lived To Be A Git?” Graham asked.

Sirius choked on his water.

“Some of the younger years call him that,” Graham said with a smirk.

“I mean,” Sirius said, “I can’t disagree.”

“Have you ever even spoken to him?” Harry asked.

Sirius glared down at his plate. “Nope.”

“Figures.” Harry got up and sent his dishes flying into the sink with a thought. “I’m going to go brew for a bit. Graham, want to come?”

“Can you show me something that’ll make Snape give me points?” Graham said.

Harry smirked. “What do you think?”

“Right behind you.”

Ginny began filling up the journal with messages to Harry. All of them detailed Order members and overheard snippets of conversation. She didn’t explain why the sudden interest in sharing and Harry didn’t ask, but he suspected it had something to do with the Vipers rings he’d given her and Fred and George for Yule.

He took note when she mentiones a shouting match from three days after Christmas over whether Divination was more than a load of tripe. It seemed a bit out of place given that the other conversations she sent along centered around scheduling conflicts, logistics, and recruitment.

Two days before going back to school, Harry was neck deep in Black library history books and records he’d requested from the Ministry archives when he made the connection.

Jules’ request that Harry look into the Department of Mysteries. Ginny finding an archaic record of a Seer by the name of Franceska Vablatsky and her prophecy witnessed by a French noblewoman visiting Haiti in 1578, stamped with what looked very much like an early precursor to the current Department of Mysteries seal. Shouting matches about Divination, the study of time, which was coincidentally one of the Department of Mysteries’ main areas of research.

Harry would bet his trust vault that there was a prophecy in the Department of Mysteries. Either about Riddle, or Jules, or both.

No wonder Riddle wanted it. True prophecies were rare, and if it was valid…

Spinning his wand around his fingers, Harry sat back in his chair. Maybe the prophecy was the reason Riddle went after him and Jules in the first place. It was the only thing that made sense—every bit of his personal experience with Dark-sympathizing magicals indicated they were strongly opposed to harming children. He could only see Riddle trying to murder a couple of children if he was insane, which Harry no longer believed, or if he really, truly believed that said children would one day be a threat. For example, if a rare true prophecy told him so.

And there was no way Jules knew.

How interesting.

_JP_

_What do you know about Occlumency?_

_HB_

_It’s the art of learning how to protect your mind, why?_

_JP_

_Snape came around. Apparently Professor Dumbledore’s ordered him to teach it to me._

_HB_

_…I don’t see that ending well. Can’t Dumbledore teach you?_

_JP_

_He won’t talk to me._

_HB_

_That’s weird._

_JP_

_And bloody annoying. I’m supposed to say I’m taking Remedial Potions. Dad’s pissed. He and Snape got into a shouting match. I thought Snape was going to Crucio him when he called him Snivellus—I’ve never seen the greasy git that mad. _

_HB_

_Good luck with that._

_Occlumency is legitimate, though. And really useful. It’d be worth you learning it._

_JP_

_I’ll see what I can do, but I can’t imagine Snape being good at teaching it to me_

_There’s no way I’m letting him in my head._

_HB_

_Maybe that’s why Dumbledore wants him to teach you. Motivation_

_JP_

_Motivation to smash up his office maybe_

Fred informed him that the Order was having difficulties guarding whatever they were guarding, as the Ministry was now on high alert. Luna informed him that her father thought the runes burned into Arthur Weasley’s skin were the result of hypersensitive wards reacting to the presence of an intruder. Harry informed Fred, George, and Ginny of this secret. Jules informed Harry that the twins had begun causing hell for everyone in the Burrow to the point that Order meetings moved to Bones Manor.

The adults thought they were just acting out from grief.

Theo sat down hard enough to make the entire sofa bounce slightly. Harry ignored him and squinted at the heavily annotated potions book in his lap. He was trying to transfer things into his grimoire but this book had gotten an experimental Fireproof Potion splashed on it at some point and smeared some of his notes.

“Problem,” Theo said.

“What is?”

A copy of the Prophet landed on his textbook.

Harry skimmed the cover. “Yes, I’ve seen this already.”

“If this passes, they’ll be able to search manor homes at will on unproven suspicions of Dark artifacts,” Theo hissed. “It’s a _disgrace.”_

“I’m aware.” Harry folded the Prophet and set it aside, movements precise. He looked up at Theo and raised both eyebrows expectantly.

Theo glared back for a few seconds before his ire dissolved. “You’re already working on it, aren’t you?”

“Aren’t _you_?” Harry said. “Heir Nott?”

“Father is.”

Harry nodded. “And Sirius. I can’t do anything he’s not already working on—not as a fifteen-year-old schoolboy, anyway.” 

“Of course.” Theo leaned back, the picture of boredom. “I should’ve known you Blacks would be hiding your secrets, too.”

It was a backhanded apology, but Harry accepted it with a smirk. “Seen Graham and Veronica?” he asked, changing the subject.

“Pansy may have mentioned something.”

“There’s a betting pool on whether they date next year.”

Theo glanced across the common room. Several upper years had gravitated towards Harry but hovered on the periphery of his friends’ usual circle of chairs and sofas, unwilling to interrupt his work. The second years preferred a spot by the windows into the lake. Veronica and Lillian Pym appeared to be exchanging verbal barbs while Malcolm Baddock watched impassively.

“Interesting split in that year,” Theo mused.

Harry nodded slowly. Pym might be a problem later. Then again, she might not; that was more an internal issue for their form than an indication she might turn on older Slytherins. Pym had the sense to be respectful of Harry and the other upper years of high social standing, at least.

“Want help?” Theo asked, gesturing at the book in Harry’s lap.

“Not at the moment.” Harry set the book aside. “I might need to try some restorative charms on this; the spilled potion’s left it a mess.”

“Mmm.” Theo prodded the stained pages with a slight curl of his lip. “I heard back from Astoria—she’s got the hag wrapped around her finger. Lisa Turpin’s next on the docket for Veritaserum interrogation.”

Harry ran through his Ravenclaw Vipers in his head. He considered Lisa a loose friend but he didn’t trust her enough to hand her antidote. It would come better from an older Housemate, and someone with authority who could tell her to keep quiet about it. “I’ll have Aaron slip her some antidote tomorrow,” Harry said. “And warn her to not make a fuss, we just have to wait her out.”

Theo nodded. “I’ll have Blaise make sure he gets some tonight.”

“Why Blaise? I thought he and Iris broke it off. Again.”

“They did,” Theo said with a massive, shit-eating grin. “You shouldn’t have skipped dinner. Missed _all_ the drama. Blaise and Luna are going out now.”

Harry choked on air and stared at his friend. “They… _are?”_

“She waltzed right up to him at the table, made some comment about expelling his wrackspurts, and laid one on him.” Theo closed his eyes, relishing the memory. “Then she just walked away. I have never in my _life_ seen Blaise Zabini speechless. It was beautiful.”

“Huh.” Harry blinked a few times. “I actually did not see that coming. The meeting tomorrow should be interesting.”

“Very,” Theo agreed.

_Ginny_

She couldn’t wait to get back to school.

In Slytherin, she had a place in the hierarchy and people knew not to antagonize her. In Slytherin, if they did anyway, testing her position, she could hit them with a Bat-Bogey Hex or a vicious insult in return, and she’d be respected for it. Not shunned. In Slytherin, she could escape Ron and Percy’s overbearing concern for the silence of the dungeons.

In the last week, Ginny had already developed a compulsive habit of turning her Viper ring around and around her right index finger.

Mum hadn’t allowed her to see any of her friends over the holidays. Ginny stepped out of McGonagall’s Floo, endured the Transfiguration professor’s stiff disapproval of a Weasley in Slytherin, and bolted straight down to her common room. Nat took one look at her face and pulled her into a hug. Alex awkwardly patted her on the back and Finn cracked seven ridiculous jokes in a row and Evalyn sat next to her in quiet support.

Then she tugged them into a corner of the common room, in a circle of chairs loosely adjacent to the one Harry’s circle had claimed last year.

“Silencing wards,” she said quietly.

Evalyn and Aria went to work.

Ginny took a deep breath when they’d gone up and told them what Harry had found out. Dad died because he went somewhere he shouldn’t have, tested one set of Ministry wards too many, and he’d done it on Dumbledore’s orders.

She’d cried herself out already in her room. She had no more tears. Only the grief, heavy and unending. It pressed her down until it was all she could do to function as a normal person.

At home, she had no one to lean on. Ginny allowed herself one moment of weakness and slumped sideways, until Nat and Alex were helping support her.

_Jules_

He wished he was almost anywhere other than Snape’s bloody dungeon.

Coming down here alone felt like _asking_ for trouble. The dungeons were Slytherin territory. Not that Jules had _actually_ ever come down here alone and been set upon by a pack of snakes, but then again, he almost never came down here alone. Or at all, outside Potions class.

Almost as bad as the risk of running into a random Slytherin was the risk of running into Harry.

Jules shook that thought aside and knocked firmly on the classroom door. Harry was pretending to fit in with them, to gain their trust. He wasn’t _actually_ as bad as Malfoy or Nott or that Parkinson bint that Parvati hated so much.

The door creaked open grudgingly. Jules stepped into the familiar, hated room. He scanned it, but there was no sight of Snape, just the usual shelves bearing slimy things in jars, the potions cupboard—

Dumbledore’s Pensieve?

“Shut the door behind you, Potter.”

Jules jumped, caught sight of Snape in the corner, and did as he was told with the horrible feeling that he was imprisoning himself.

“Why has Professor Dumbledore decided that I need to learn this?” Jules said.

“This may not be an ordinary class,” Snape said malevolently, “but I am still your teacher and you will therefore call me ‘sir’ or ‘Professor’ at all times.”

“Yes… _sir_ ,” Jules said.

“Now, Occlumency. As I told you in the Weasleys’ kitchen…” _Since Dad won’t let you in our house_ , Jules thought vindictively, “this branch of magic seals the mind against magical intrusion and influence. Surely even you could have worked out by yourself why you need to learn it—despite your brother evidently having taken all the intellectual gifts from your parents’ gene pool. The Dark Lord is highly skilled at Legilimency.”

Jules’ fury took a sudden nosedive into horror. “He can read minds?”

“You have no subtlety, Potter,” Snape said, eyes glittering. “You do not understand fine distinctions. It is one of the shortcomings that makes you such a lamentable potion-maker.”

He paused for a moment, which Jules took to control his mounting anger. Fucking Slytherin bastard. Snape was the worst of the lot and a Death Eater besides.

“Only Muggles talk of ‘mind reading.’ The mind is not a book, to be opened at will and examined at leisure. Thoughts are not etched on the inside of skulls, to be perused by any invader. The mind is a complex and many-layered thing, Potter… or at least, most minds are… It is true, however, that those who have mastered Legilimency are able, under certain conditions, to delve into the minds of their victims and to interpret their findings correctly. The Dark Lord, for instance, almost always knows when somebody is lying to him. Only those skilled at Occlumency are able to shut down those feelings and memories that contradict the lie, and so utter falsehoods in his presence without detection.”

“Sounds a lot like mind reading to me,” Jules said. “Sir.”

Snape’s scowl deepened.

“So… how close does he have to be for it to work?” Jules asked, trying to hurry things along. He’d spoken without thinking and it was satisfying but also Dumbledore would be mad if Jules mucked his up in the first lesson. Dumbledore was already not talking to him for—some strange reason. Jules had to do this right.

“So you _do_ have some capacity for attempting to ask an insightful question,” Snape mused. “I confess myself shocked… The Dark Lord is presently at a considerable distance, and the walls and grounds of Hogwarts are guarded by many ancient spells and charms to ensure the bodily and mental safety of those who dwell within. Time and space matter in magic, Potter. Eye contact is often essential to Legilimency.”

Jules resolved to avoid looking Snape in the eye from now on. “Well then, why do I have to learn Occlumency?”

“The usual rules seem not to apply to you, Potter,” Snape sneered. “In this circumstance just as every other.” _Well duh,_ Jules thought. _I’m not exactly normal._ “The curse that failed to kill you seems to have forged some kind of connection between you and the Dark Lord. The Headmaster is worried that when your mind is most relaxed and vulnerable—when you are asleep, for instance—you may begin to share the Dark Lord’s thoughts and emotions. He thinks this inadvisable and wishes to teach you to block the connection before it becomes a danger.”

Jules’ heart was pumping. “So… I have a _connection_ to him,” he said slowly. “My scar—that’s why it hurt around Quirrell, right?”

“That is the prevailing theory, yes.”

“But why does Professor Dumbledore want me to stop it?” Jules didn’t exactly _like_ the thought of sharing Voldemort’s head, but he could just imagine Harry’s sneering contempt if he learned Jules shut off an opportunity like this. Seeing _into Voldemort’s head._ “It might be useful, mightn’t it?”

Snape stared at Harry for a few moments, idly tracing a finger over his jawbone. When he spoke again, it was very deliberate. “You are aware of my position in this war.”

“Yes,” Jules said stiffly.

“Then you will understand why I am in a position to know that the Dark Lord has begun investigating the precise nature of the connection between you.” Snape’s lips twisted. “He has found himself bested by you several times now. He does not fully understand how any more than we do.” Jules’ stomach did something funny. He didn’t like being reminded that in the graveyard, it was _Harry_ who got their asses out of there alive. “It is only a matter of time before he discovers the connection and attempts to use it.”

“How come I haven’t seen what Voldemort’s thinking already, then?”

 _“Do not say the Dark Lord’s name!”_ spat Snape.

There was a nasty silence. Jules glared at his father’s nemesis and bit back a number of insults based on Snape’s past as a Death Eater, or the nickname Snivellus, or both.

“Professor Dumbledore says his name,” he said finally.

“Dumbledore is an extremely powerful wizard,” Snape said. “While _he_ may feel secure enough to use the name… the rest of us…” He rubbed his left forearm, apparently unconsciously, where Jules knew the Dark Mark was burned into him.

“I just wanted to know,” Jules said, forcing his tone back towards politeness, “why—”

“The Dark Lord is a master Occlumens as well as Legilimens,” Snape said. “Most likely he has simply not noticed the connection, as his mental shields would take three standard master Legilimens to break, and he keeps them active at all times. When he does, however, you will be in danger.”

“Of… possession?”

Snape nodded stiffly.

Jules’ dinner abruptly tried to fight its way back out of his stomach. He swallowed hard.

“Which brings us back to Occlumency.” Snape drew his wand and Jules tensed, but Snape just raised the wand to his temple and started extracting memories. Jules had seen the process a few times when he was a kid and Dumbledore was showing him memories for their history lessons, most of which focused around old Order of the Phoenix meetings since he wasn’t about to show a nine-year-old any battle scenes. No matter how much Jules begged.

He watched with interest as the silver memory strands fell into the Pensieve and decided to brave a question he’d never thought to ask when Dumbledore was using one. “If the memories are going in the Pensieve, then do you still have them in your head?” he asked.

Snape glared at him. “Indeed, but only the most talented of Legilimens could uncover the fragments I retain in my mind, and I cannot consciously show them to another.”

Jules _really_ wanted to know what Snape was putting into the Pensieve, and why Snape was worried Jules might see into _his_ head when Jules had barely even heard of Legilimency before tonight. The hostility rippling off the greasy dungeon bat warned him to not ask either question unless he wanted to be decapitated.

“Stand up and draw your wand,” Snape ordered.

“And what are you going to do?” Jules said, eyeing Snape’s wand. He flicked his own out into his hand and braced himself.

“I am about to attempt to break into you rmind,” said Snape softly. “We are going to see how well you resist. I have been told that you have already shown some aptitude at resisting the Imperius Curse… even if you were not the _most_ successful in that regard… You will find that similar strength of mind is needed here. Brace yourself, and clear your mind.”

Jules thought that clearing his mind of the anger pounding all through him would be like chopping off a leg but he did his best.

Snape pointed his wand. _“Legilimens.”_

He’d struck before Jules was ready—before he had any kind of resistance—Jules really wished he hadn’t thrown a tantrum to avoid meditation lessons when he was little—

The office swam before his eyes and vanished. Image after image raced through his mind. He was eight and leading his Quidditch Kids’ team to victory, ten and smiling happily on a stage next to Dad while people asked them questions and took pictures, eleven and watching his father storm out of the house to collect the not-actually-a-Squib Harry Potter, fifteen and flirting with a random girl under the mistletoe…

He felt a sharp pain in his knee. Snape’s office snapped back into view. Jules had fallen to the floor, one knee colliding painfully with the leg of Snape’s desk. He looked up. Snape was rubbing one wrist with an angry weal on it.

“Did you mean to produce a Stinging Hex?” asked Snape coolly.

“No,” Jules snarled, getting up. Fucking _bastard_.

“I thought not,” Snape said contemptuously. “You must _order your mind_ , Potter. You let me in too far. You lost control.”

“Did you see everything I saw?” Jules asked.

“Flashes of it,” Snape said, lip curling. “Did your moronic father truly believe Hadrian to be a Squib?”

“Yeah,” Jules said sullenly, hating Snape.

“For a first attempt that was not as poor as it might have been,” said Snape. “You wasted time shouting and you have _no_ awareness of your own mind, nor control over your emotions, which are key components of passive Occlumency. Your father was appallingly remiss to not get you tutoring.”

Jules flushed. No way was he telling Snape that Dad _had_ actually gotten that meditation tutor, which looking back was probably supposed to come before Occlumency, until Jules decided it was boring.

“Remain focused this time. Repel me with our brain and you will not need to resort to your wand.”

“I’m trying,” Jules snapped, “but you’re not telling me how!”

“I have just done so, Potter,” Snape said dangerously. “Control your emotions. Clear your mind. Close your eyes.”

Jules threw him a filthy look before shutting his eyes. This only made him more tense. Standing in front of a bloody _Death Eater_ with his eyes closed, _voluntarily_ , was one of the stupidest things he’d done in a while.

“Clear your mind, Potter,” said Snape’s cold voice. “Let go of all emotion…”

He tried, he really did, but anger was pounding through his veins like venom.

“You’re not doing it, Potter… you will need more discipline than this… Focus, now…”

Jules tried to empty his mind, tried not to think, or remember, or feel…

“Let’s go again… on the count of three… one—two—three— _Legilimens!”_

He blinked and he was nine and getting on his first Quidditch-class broom, six and playing in Bones Manor with Ernie and Susan and Ron, fourteen and hiding from a dragon, eleven and seeing his family plus a decent Gryffindor Harry in a mirror, fourteen and watching beads of light slide toward him and knowing somewhere his brother was fighting for their lives—

“Nooooo!”

He was on his knees again, face buried in his hands.

Not that again. Jules could _not_ go through that again.

Fuck, he’d been so _pathetic._

“Get up!” Snape said sharply. “Get up! You are not trying, you are utterly failing to control your mind, you are allowing me access to memories you fear, handing me weapons!”

Jules clambered to his feet. His heart was thumping even harder now. Snape was paler than usual, and angrier, though not as angry as Jules.

Fucking Slytherins, always with the emotional control shit. Dumbledore always said emotions and the ability to love were what made you strong. Not this—this stupid tripe.

“It doesn’t matter if I fear them,” he said through gritted teeth.”

“Yes, it _does_ ,” Snape hissed.

“Courage is acting despite fear. Not an absence of it. Sir.” Jules was actually quite proud of himself for remembering that one. Neville had stuck a bit of parchment with that quote on it up on the wall in their dorm last year. Jules hadn’t recognized the handwriting.

“Courage is all well and good but it is _useless_ for this art. Fear is a chink in your mental armor, Potter! _All_ emotion is weakness when learning Occlumency. You must empty yourself of emotion. ”

“Yeah? Well, I’m finding that hard at the moment,” Jules snarled.

“Then you will find yourself easy prey for the Dark Lord!” said Snape savagely. “Fools who wear their hearts proudly on their sleeves, who cannot control their emotions, who wallow in sad memories and allow themselves to be provoked this easily—weak people, in other words—they stand no chance against his powers! He will infiltrate your mind with absurd ease!”

“I am not weak,” Jules said in a low voice. He was so angry that he thought his magic might lash out and attack Snape on its own.

“Then prove it! Master yourself!” Snape spat. “Control your anger, discipline your mind! If you cannot do so when facing _me_ , how do you have any chance whatsoever before the Dark Lord? We shall try again! Get ready, now! _Legilimens!”_

The world vanished.

Jules fought it. He tried to pummel his anger into a box—tried to think of nothing at all—for some reason Harry’s face swam into mind, that faint smirk and cold gaze that Jules was only now realizing might be nothing more than a mask—was Harry an Occlumens?

Thinking about his brother brought a wild swirl of emotions to life. Jules’ control slipped.

He was five and surrounded in Diagon Alley by reporters and fans and clicking cameras, terrified, only his father’s hand on his shoulder keeping him still, five and looking up and seeing Dad’s face, so delighted and pleased and _proud_. He was six and visiting Riasmoore and there were loads of people staring at him in the windows but this time it felt a little hostile and he was angry because didn’t they know who he _was_? He was eight and crashing off his broom ashamed of having lost the game and half-blind with pain from a broken arm. He was thirteen and staring at a dementor on the train.

Jules felt the memory approaching. A pile of papers forgotten on the table, marked with things he wasn’t allowed to know. Paired with the memory of spidery handwriting and the initials _HB_ scrawling across an open notebook.

Snape _could not see that_.

Something shattered.

Jules blinked, hard. This time he’d ended up on all fours, panting heavily.

Too close. Too bloody close. In this _one_ area, Jules thought Dumbledore’s judgment was suspect, and he didn’t trust Snape to save Jules from anything less than a fatal accident. It would be _just_ like the man to find out about Harry and Jules trying to figure out what the hell the Order was doing, and then tell Dumbledore and Dad, and Jules couldn’t have Dumbledore disappointed in him right now, they’d told him to get Harry’s trust but he was pretty sure they hadn’t meant to _actually_ work with him, just use him—

So he said the first thing that came to mind. “What’s in the Department of Mysteries?”

“What did you say?” Snape asked quietly.

“I said, what’s in the Department of Mysteries, _sir?”_

“And why,” Snape said slowly, “would you ask such a thing?”

“I heard Dung say it over break.”

Snape looked expressionlessly back at Jules. Belatedly he remembered what Snape had said about Legilimens being good at knowing when someone was lying, and tried to think about how _absolutely_ pissed he was at the man and how much he _hated_ Dad’s nemesis and also Voldemort—

“There are many things in the Department of Mysteries, Potter, few of which you would understand and none of which concern you, do I make myself plain?”

“Yes,” Jules said mutinously. “Does any of it concern Voldemort?”

_“I have told you not to say the Dark Lord’s name!”_

They glared at each other. Jules wasn’t faking the tremble in his fists. He was barely holding himself back from the bastard. Snape was keeping secrets and attacking his mind and not teaching and—

“Enough,” Snape said softly. “I want you back here same time on Wednesday, and we will continue work then.”

“Fine.”

“You are to rid your mind of all emotion every night before sleep—empty it, make it blank and calm, you understand?”

“Yes,” said Jules, barely listening. Maybe if he went to Dumbledore’s office… he’d grown up with Dumbledore coming ‘round once a month, after all… he _liked_ Jules, he was friends with Dad…

“And be warned, Potter… I shall know if you have not practiced…”

“Right,” Jules said, slinging his bag over his shoulder and bolting.

He didn’t run through the dungeons no matter how he wanted to. That was a fantastic way to either slam into a wall or get lost, seeing as Hogwarts liked to shift around a little. The dungeons’ changes were sneakier and less dramatic than the staircases in the towers, but they all looked the same. How the Slytherins ever found their way up to breakfast Jules had _no_ clue.

“Watch it!”

Jules stumbled back, scowling even deeper. He’d just stormed around a corner and run straight into an older Slytherin boy flanked by a few other snakes. “ _You_ watch it,” he spat.

“Oho,” the boy sneered. “Ickle Potty’s got himself lost in the snake pit, hm?”

“Are you lost, Potty?” a girl said. Jules thought that was Fawley, and the boy in the lead was—Everett Kinney. The other two were unknown sixth years.

“No,” he snarled.

“Spying on some snakes, then,” one of the unfamiliar boys said with a smirk.

 _“No.”_ Jules’ fists clenched.

Kinney flicked out his wand and twirled it around his fingers in a weirdly familiar gesture. “Then what—”

A new drawl cut through the tension, one Jules recognized. Nott. “Potter’s taking remedial Potions.”

The Slytherins laughed meanly. Jules stepped to the side so he could take in the newcomer without turning his back on the four in front of him. Unknown Boy One raised his eyebrows, which was the only indication of any Slytherin noticing his gesture.

“Relax, Potter,” Nott said with a cruel grin. Jules’ hands were really shaking now. Of all the Slytherins, Nott was probably the worst. How Harry could be friends with this cold, vicious asshole he had _no_ idea. “We don’t take down lions wandering on their own without provocation. We’re honorable like that.”

“What would _you_ know of honor?” Jules snarled.

Nott raised an eyebrow. “More than you.”

“I was going to show him the way back to the entrance hall,” Fawley whined, pouting her perfect lips.

“Mhm,” Nott said. “And you’d have taken the shortest route, I’m sure.”

For a second, Jules thought the other Slytherins weren’t going to back off—

Nott sighed and crossed his arms, tapping the fingers of his right hand against his left elbow.

Jules frowned. For some reason, that made all the other Slytherins sheath their fangs in unison. Unknown Boy Two jostled Jules on the way by and he had to actively grip his robes to keep himself from drawing his wand.

Nott paused, eyes lingering on Jules’ forehead.

“Like what you see?” Jules challenged, shoving his hair back so his scar was there for all to see. He was just glad it hadn’t been hurting like last year. “A nice physical reminder your precious Voldie has a weakness.”

“No one’s perfect,” Nott said. Jules faltered a little as surprise cut through his fury. “Not you, and not even Harry.”

“What’s Harry got to do with this?” Jules snapped.

Nott’s lips twisted into a weird little smile. “He’s your brother, isn’t he? Despite Lord Potter’s… interference.”

“I… suppose,” Jules admitted grudgingly. “And you’re his friend, so what?”

His friend. Which meant—if Jules wanted any hope with Harry, at all, it was probably a bad idea to keep antagonizing the bastard.

“So Harry didn’t grow up with a family.” Nott’s eyes left the scar and locked onto Jules’. “He’s rather protective of what he’s got left. It would hurt him if you merrily follow your father’s footsteps, so for his sake, I’m warning you. Don’t do that. And quit being such an arrogant prat, if you can manage it.”

Jules stared at the other boy. Nott had always unnerved him. He wasn’t particularly handsome, and his sandy brown hair and brownish eyes didn’t exactly stick out, but something about his quiet stillness always…

Jules didn’t trust him. And far as Jules was concerned, Nott was a big part of the reason Harry had gone to Slytherin in the first place and got them all in this mess. But—Harry’s _friend._

“My dad—isn’t perfect,” Jules ground out at last. “I don’t… want to lose Harry as thoroughly as he did. We’re working on it.”

For a split second, he thought he saw an actual emotion on Nott’s face. Surprise, suspicion, something more positive, Jules wasn’t sure, and then it was gone before he had a chance to figure it out. “Being civil with one of Harry’s friends? I’m shocked and delighted to see you finally using your brain.”

“You lot don’t make it easy,” Jules snapped, crossing his arms.

Nott smiled, bright and cold like winter sunlight. “If we did, then I wouldn’t know you meant it.”

Jules made a face and left. If he hung around any longer, he was going to either say something angry or throw a punch. He’d been given explicit instructions from the Order to not antagonize anyone with Death Eater connections if he could help it. Which, unfortunately, included Nott.

On the other hand, it made a weird sort of sense that they were assholes because they thought Jules was faking.

Dumbledore’s statue snidely informed him that the Headmaster was busy and could not speak to Jules at this time.

Between Snape and Dumbledore he was in a towering rage by the time he made it back to the dorms and snapped at a group of younger Gryffindors who were clustered near the portrait hole. They took a frightened look at him and bolted. Nott’s comment came back and Jules felt worse than ever.

_Theo_

“Hey.”

Theo looked up from Umbridge’s latest ream of homework with relief. “Yeah?”

“Remember our contingency plan for the journals?” Harry said, sliding into a seat across from him.

Theo raised an eyebrow. Intriguing. “Yes.”

Harry smiled slowly. “I have an idea. It’ll involve the goblins and a patent on the journals.”

“I’m listening.”

As Harry laid out his plan, Theo couldn’t hide his delight. _Finally_ they were making a move.

_Harry_

“Like this, Liam,” he said, correcting the younger boy’s wand movements. “More of a flick, less of a jab—yes, there you go, much better!”

Ten feet away, Celesta scowled. “Remind me why I’m playing target practice for Stinging Hexes?” she snapped.

“You lost a bet at Quidditch practice,” Harry said without missing a beat, pointing Liam at the dummies and calling Veronica over. “And how can they know it’s working without a live target?”

“I hate you,” Celesta muttered.

Harry winked at Veronica.

The second-year grinned back at him and pointed her wand at Celesta. _“Volculeus!”_

Celesta flinched and scowled harder.

“Be glad we’re not doing Incontinence until next week,” Harry advised.

Veronica snickered and Celesta rolled her eyes.

Harry looked over; all the other second and third years had stopped their drilling on the Stinging Hex and moved on to the Choking Curse, using dummies. “All right, Celesta, you’re done.”

“Delighted,” she drawled, stalking past him with a glower. Harry wasn’t fooled. He and Celesta actually got on quite well these days. She just liked irritating everyone around her.

“How’s your other project going?” Harry said.

Veronica shrugged. “We’ve got two Muggle-borns, and a couple of halfbloods, and another kid whose family’s like Graham’s. Astoria and Romilda are helping me run a study group for them and they’ve gotten good at dodging the Umbitch with Notice-Me-Nots. It seems to be going well.”

“This is the Muggle-born and halfblood thing, right?” Graham said, leaving off target practice and joining their conversation.

Harry decided it was likely to go on for a few minutes and flicked his wand, conjuring three chairs. They sat down and ignored the shouts of spellwork and dueling challenges ringing through the Chamber. “Yes. There’s been a slight but noticeable increase in our non-pureblood population already.”

“Actually, Graham, you should come help with the study group,” Veronica said. “Malcolm sucks at teaching and you could help Mylie Roper from Ravenclaw. Her whole family’s sort of dysfunctional.”

Graham’s eyes darted to Harry. “How dysfunctional?”

“Not moving out dysfunctional,” Veronica said, “but I think she could use some support.”

“I’ll come.” Graham’s fist, visible only to Harry, clenched.

They both looked at Harry.

“Go for it,” he said. “Veronica, keep an eye on who might be catching flak from the other Houses. Give Daphne names of anyone being particularly awful. And next year we can think about bringing a few of them into the Vipers so consider who might be suited for that versus who’s best left as a peripheral contact.”

“Got it.”

“All right, back to practice,” Harry said. “You don’t get to try _ango_ on people until you’ve got the spell down on the dummies.”

“Thanks,” Veronica said, beaming.

Graham lingered a bit. Harry vanished the chairs and shot him a questioning look.

“Dad sent me a Howler.”

“Of course he did,” Harry sighed. “You used Blaise’s spell to freeze it, I assume?”

“Yeah,” Graham said. “Opened it in an abandoned classroom in the dungeons.”

“Don’t worry about him,” Harry said quietly but firmly. “I had Sirius contact him with regards to your living arrangements two days ago; he was just taking out his anger. Theo and Lord Nott are going to back us. You don’t have to go back to them.” He paused. “And if it doesn’t work out legally, you can ‘run away’ and we’ll kidnap you. Polyjuice you into some Muggle kid if we have to go to Diagon.”

Graham looked like a weight had just been lifted off his shoulders. “Thank you.”

“Rule one,” Harry said with as gentle a smile as he could manage. “And if that Mylie Roper kid has it bad, tell her she can come to me.”

The kid beamed at him and jogged back to his target, in between Liam and Veronica.

Harry watched them for a few moments, until Noah came over for his turn supervising the kids. They exchanged a nod and Harry caught the older boy up on what the younger set was working on, and then he headed back up to his study.

He had to dodge several duels on the way. Harry paused to watch Hestia and Daphne go at it; spells flew furiously and it didn’t look like it would be ending soon. Although Hestia had a _slight_ upper hand.

Aaron, Iris, and Blaise were clustered up talking to Sam Graves; it was Sam’s second full Vipers meeting-and-dueling-session and Harry had instructed the others to make his introduction as easy as possible. Blaise caught his eye and nodded. Harry paused with a warm smile to welcome Sam back down to the Chamber. “Thanks for this,” Sam said, flashing his bronze scale-patterned ring with a grin.

“It’s a pleasure to have you,” Harry said. “I’m sure you’ll be an invaluable part of the group.”

“They’re good.” Sam nodded at Daphne and Hestia.

All five of them turned to watch the girls’ vicious duel for a few seconds. Jordan Harper, Hestia’s boyfriend Adrian, Mason, and Flora paced around the dueling wards, silent but watching intently.

“Yeah, they are,” Aaron agreed. “Pro tip: don’t piss either of them off.”

“Noted,” Sam muttered.

Harry laughed along with the rest and excused himself.

He found Pansy in the study. “Stealing my chair?” he said, leaning on the doorframe.

“It’s temporary, don’t get all possessive,” she drawled, flicking through the papers strewn over the top of it. “This is the goblin negotiation, isn’t it?”

“Brilliant deduction. Was it the Gobbledeygook translation charms that tipped you off?”

“Funnily enough, it _was_.” Pansy finally looked up and grinned at him. “It’s an excellent plan. What do you have in mind for James?”

“Something a bit later,” Harry said. He conjured a second chair and Pansy switched to that one. Harry’s favorite in the office was the thousand-year-old armchair upholstered in dragon leather and absolutely smothered in preservation charms. Salazar Slytherin had good taste. “Ethan is most of James’ political acumen.”

“True. You’re sure about the patent though?”

“Everyone’s agreed, and I’ll give them each a payout from my vaults. Not a huge one, but enough to offset the loss. We didn’t design the journals with a patent and manufacturing in mind anyway.”

Pansy nodded. “Good point. Neville says you’ve even got his Gran involved.”

“I have,” Harry said with a thin smile. Getting Augusta on board had been a stroke of luck. “She was quite eager to help take down Ethan Thorne. Seems to see him as a new-money ass-kissing abuse-excusing usurper.”

“She’s not wrong.”

Harry laughed a bit. “No, she’s not.”

Running footsteps sounded on the balcony outside the study. Pansy and Harry drew their wands in unison; she withdrew until she was half-shielded by his body since he was by far the stronger duelist—

“Harry, sorry to—interrupt but—it’s the twins,” Demelza panted.

“Fuck,” Pansy hissed.

Harry rubbed one temple. “What’d they do now?”

Demelza sucked in a few deep breaths. “Third prank in—as many days. Umbridge is floating up near the ceiling of the Great Hall. She _knows_ it’s them, she’s had Filch confiscate their brooms.”

“He can’t,” Pansy said. “Dumbledore should step in.”

“New Decree, from this morning.” Everett had followed Demelza in, expression grim. Harry remembered that he and the twins were on at least cordial terms now. “She can step in for crimes against her person with much greater authority. We’re pretty sure they pushed it through after her _mysterious_ fall down four flights of stairs earlier this week.”

That was definitely a headache forming. Fred and George had been on a bit of a rampage since they came back to school. McGonagall had gotten it a few times, and Snape, known Order sympathizers, and even Dumbledore had had the bones in his left foot regrown after he stepped on a rune-trap and all of them were crushed into gravel. “If she has no evidence she’ll have to release them,” Harry said. “ _Has_ she any evidence?”

“Not this time.” Everett ran a hand through his hair. “But it’s only a matter of time. And the brooms will piss them off even more.”

“I’ll see if I can rein them in,” Harry said. It went unsaid that he was the only person in the castle with a hope of doing so. “Pansy, can you finish off that last letter to Stonemace? Show it to Theo before you send it off.”

“No problem.” Pansy snagged a quill and several parchments.

“Go join the others, Demelza,” Harry said, ushering her out of the study ahead of Everett. “Theo’s got the fourth years drilling blinding curses today.”

“Thanks,” Demelza said.

Harry and Everett lingered as she jogged down the balcony steps and vanished out into the main Chamber. “They’re becoming a problem,” Everett said quietly. “Telling them how their dad really died…”

“I wasn’t going to keep it from them,” Harry said. “They’ve been loyal. They deserve that much.”

Everett shrugged. “I know why you did it. Just—control the fallout or we’re all at risk.”

Harry’s posture shifted slightly as he turned. He wasn’t particularly tall and he had to look up to meet Everett’s gaze. It didn’t matter. Everett only lasted a few seconds in the face of Harry’s silence before he backed down. “Sorry.”

“If they make the hag’s life difficult, I won’t complain,” Harry said, softening _just_ a little. Everett couldn’t quite hide his relief. Harry wanted people who would speak their minds but Everett was not in a position to call Harry out like that, and he needed to know it. “So long as they don’t get caught. And if they do, it won’t connect back to us. They wouldn’t let that happen.”

“True.” Everett shoved his hands in his pockets. “Need me to do anything on this one?”

“Not today.” Harry started walking along the balcony and Everett fell in at his side without hesitation. “I’ll go sort out this mess and hopefully drum a bit of caution into their skulls. Theo’ll be in charge.”

Everett nodded and left it at that.

He broke off to duel with Adrian and Peregrine in the main Chamber. Harry paused just long enough to give Theo a condensed version of the latest Weasley drama with the instruction to end the meeting in half an hour if Harry wasn’t back by then.


	2. Ch 16

Eriss found him about halfway up to the entrance hall. _“Why are you angry?”_

 _“Fred and George are… being reckless.”_ He wandlessly swept her up without breaking stride and settled the four-foot snake around his shoulders.

_“Fiendfyre twins.”_

Harry grinned at Luna’s nickname, although it was partly a grimace, because lately it had been all too clear why she came up with that. _“Yes. Them.”_

_“You will tell them to stop.”_

_“It’s not that simple. Their father just died.”_

Eriss made a discontented noise. _“I will never understand humans’ attachment to their egg-mothers and egg-fathers.”_

_“And I don’t have absolute control over them. Just more than most.”_

_“You are the strongest. You are the leader. They do as you wish.”_

_“Humans don’t work quite that easily.”_

Eriss prodded him with her tail. _“Snakes are simpler. If there is a conflict, the stronger is dominant. Be more of a snake and less of a human.”_

 _“I’m working on it,”_ he grumbled. _“If I just take an absolute control stance—they’re anarchic. They’d just fight me harder.”_

_“Then they are foolish.”_

He left her to her grumbling.

The Marauders’ Map showed a number of people near the entrance hall, so Harry took the dungeon exit, and hurried through the damp quiet passages on a normal route. He’d look like he just came out of the Slytherin dorms. The Map showed the twins still in Filch’s office with Umbridge; if they didn’t come out in twenty minutes—

“Black!”

 _Dammit_. Harry schooled his features and turned around. “Yes, sir?”

“My office,” Snape said, already striding away.

Harry swore again in his head and followed his professor. If nothing else this would kill some time before he needed to stage a diversion and figure out what the hell was going on in Filch’s office.

Actually—

 _“Go to Filch’s office,”_ he hissed under his breath. _“Stay hidden, enlist a smaller snake if you have to, and if the twins are being—tortured or something, call me.”_

_“Can I bite the flabby toad woman?”_

_“I’d prefer that you didn’t.”_

_“Humans are soft.”_ With that parting shot, Eriss slid down his leg, hit the floor with a soft _thud_ , and took off back the way he’d come.

Harry lengthened his stride and caught up to Snape outside the Potions Master’s office. Snape wordlessly pointed inside. Harry sat down in the deliberately uncomfortable chair in front of the desk and deliberately adopted a posture that suggested it was the most comfortable thing he’d ever seen.

Snape sat down across from him and glared for a few seconds.

“Have I done something, Professor?” Harry said politely.

“No doubt,” Snape said. “You are frequently doing things, Black. Most of them I have no desire to know about, as teenage inanity kills enough of my brain cells already without me voluntarily seeking more of it in my spare time.”

Harry’s lips twitched. “Indeed, sir.”

“I was pleased to see that Mr. Malfoy is doing a fine job upholding the honor of Slytherin House as a prefect.”

“As was I.” Harry doubted Snape had only called him in here to talk about the Malfoy-as-Prefect issue.

“You are stepping into quite a leadership role in Slytherin.”

Harry inclined his head. “I do what any Slytherin would.”

“No,” Snape said slowly, “you tend to do rather more.” He raised one eyebrow.

Harry sat back a little and let the tiniest of cruel smirks play over his face. Wasn’t his problem if Snape knew or suspected about the Vipers. He couldn’t do jack shit without proof and the Chamber was inaccessible to anyone except Harry and his Vipers. If they were even accompanied by anyone who wasn’t keyed into the wards, the passages wouldn’t open. There was no proof other than their word against his. And that was only if any of them actually betrayed him and spilled to a teacher, which Harry highly doubted was the case.

The silence stretched and grew. Harry blithely ignored it.

“I had noticed an increase in… non-pureblood Slytherins this year,” Snape drawled, barely moving his lips. “Several study groups organized by your… particular protégés.”

Harry said nothing. Snape was well aware of the politics in Slytherin. Of the Heads of House, Flitwick and Sprout both took by far the most hands-on approaches. McGonagall essentially worked three jobs—professor, Head of House, and Deputy Headmistress—which left very little time for actively ruling the lions’ den. Hermione ranted about the chaos in the common room on a regular basis. Snape, on the other hand, took a hands-off approach because Slytherin more or less ran itself. The internal politics and house rules meant no one shamed the House and the students mostly disciplined themselves. That said, he was fully aware of the in-House hierarchy.

Snape would’ve noticed the shifting allegiances this year.

Again, Snape left a few seconds for Harry to reply before continuing. “Yesterday I happened to overhear a Howler erupting in a little-used auxiliary dungeon. A Howler sent to one Graham Pritchard from his father, who is furious that his son is a ‘blood traitor’ and a ‘deviant runaway.’ I was only slightly surprised to learn _where_ Mr. Pritchard went.”

Ah. “Slytherins look after our own,” Harry replied.

“They do.” Snape watched Harry through heavy-lidded eyes, impassive. No wonder this man had survived as a spy or double agent or whatever for so long. Harry still couldn’t sort out his true loyalties. “Thirty points to Slytherin for your House loyalty and proactive response to a fellow student in danger.”

Harry struggled not to gape. This from _Snape_ , who doled out points like it pained him whenever Harry turned in a perfect potion, which was every class.

“A pity you cannot hold an _official_ leadership position,” Snape said with a sneer. “As things stand—I presume you have a plan to deal with the situation?”

“I do.” Anger made his voice cold, anger aimed at Graham Pritchard’s fucking family. “The… state… Graham arrived in made it perfectly clear that he was in danger at home. I simply documented that. His father will want to avoid a public child abuse scandal, especially after even James Potter could not dodge the social stigma for such a heinous crime. Graham will be spending the remainder of his vacations with me or Sirius until his majority.”

Snape nodded very slightly. “Should you require any assistance with the responsibility you have taken on, I am of course available. As your Head of House.”

“I appreciate it, sir,” Harry said, and he really did. He and Snape had their differences, always had and probably always would, but they had some interests in common, including Slytherin House.

“Had you anything to do with the… _scene_ in the Great Hall this morning?” Snape said with distaste.

“You mean the resident Ministry diversion suddenly discovering the joys of weightlessness?” Harry said wryly.

Snape smirked. “I do.”

“I didn’t.” Harry sighed. “Although I wish I could’ve seen it. For the sake of such impressive spellwork, of course.”

“You wouldn’t have been on your way to… _interfere_ with the discipline of those responsible, would you?”

“Of course not,” Harry said innocently. “I was on my way to make sure that no disciplinary action was taken without evidence.”

Snape’s smirk widened ever so slightly. “As you were, Mr. Black.”

“Thank you, sir.” Harry nodded respectfully and left the office. He hadn’t gotten any particular sensations from Eriss, which he took to mean that it wasn’t a big problem, yet.

Enough time had passed since dinner that he didn’t see anyone on the way up to the entrance hall. Most students were back in their common rooms by this point, or in the library for some last-minute evening studying. He did pass a couple of Hufflepuff girls hurrying out of the Great Hall. They giggled when he smiled at him and vanished down the corridor towards their common room.

And here he’d thought Jules’ popularity would eclipse his own with girls outside Slytherin.

Several of the secret passages connected to the corridor outside Filch’s office, which was probably not a coincidence. Harry eyed them on the Map for a few minutes, guessed which one the twins were going to use for getting back to Gryffindor Tower, and pressed the right stone. Walls rumbled aside and he slipped in to wait.

A thought, and witchlight sprang to live above his head. It was much more refined now than when he’d been nine years old huddled in his cupboard with a library book desperately trying to forget his bruises. The light was steady now, and a cleaner white, and stronger. It lit up the inside of the passage and he could read the Map with no problems.

Filch and Umbridge let the twins go ten minutes later. Harry waited long enough to be almost certain they’d be coming into his passage, wiped the Map, and slid it into a pocket just as the wall rumbled aside.

George was first in, Fred on his heels. They didn’t pause when they saw him, and silently lined up facing him. Their brown eyes had lost any and all warmth.

“You need to be more careful,” Harry said in a low voice.

“That _bitch_ works for the Ministry,” Fred snarled. “If their heads weren’t up their asses Dad wouldn’t have been down there doing their fucking jobs!”

“And Dumbledore’s the one who sent him poking around the Department of Mysteries,” George finished. “The most dangerous part of the _entire fucking Ministry.”_

Harry glared. “I know both of those things. I am not going to stop you,” he hissed. “You need to _not get caught_. I only have so much influence—if you get caught assaulting Umbridge, I won’t be able to do _jack shit_. You could go to _Azkaban._ ”

That seemed to give them pause. Neither backed down but at least they didn’t fire back.

The silence stretched and grew. Harry waited them out. He was really not sure how to deal with this. The grief of losing a parent was—nothing he’d ever experienced. And Fred and George didn’t respond well to orders.

“Umbridge serves a purpose,” Harry said finally. “I’d prefer that you not run her out of the school just yet.”

“Do you support the Dark Lord?” George said bluntly.

Harry blinked. “What?”

“You heard us.” Fred crossed his arms. “Do you support the Dark Lord.”

“I don’t support mass killings, or genocide.”

“That’s not an answer.”

In all honesty… “I don’t know,” Harry said evenly. “I disagree with most of the last three hundred years of Ministry policy. I’m against Dumbledore and the Ministry, at least.”

“So you’re forming a fourth side,” Fred said.

Harry shrugged. “I’m looking out for my own interests. I have opinions about our world and I’m going to do my best to push things in the direction I think is best.” _And I intend to have considerable political power at the end of all this._

George nodded. “We want in.”

“That’s the price of us backing off Umbitch and Dumblefuck for now,” Fred said.

“You were already in,” Harry said. “You know that, right?”

“Make it official.” Fred flashed his Vipers ring. The basilisk scale set in gold reflected Harry’s white witchlight.“You think we don’t know what this little club resembles?”

“Can you stomach the political objectives?” Harry countered. “You’re pissed and grieving now, so don’t misunderstand me. I want Dark magic and blood magic to be legal again, I want to bring back the old customs, I want to push for better integration of Muggle-borns and separation from the Muggle world. Your mum and some of your siblings are going to be on the other side.”

The twins met each other’s eyes, then looked back at Harry. “We’re in,” they said.

“Fine. Welcome to the official anti-Dumbledore movement,” he said with a mocking bow. “Piss him and Umbridge off all you like but I’d prefer we not run her out of school.”

“And in the long term?” George pressed.

Harry grinned. “We’ll destroy Umbridge eventually, or certain other parties will. In the long term, we destroy her and Fudge and Dumbledore and everything they stand for.”

George and Fred returned their nasty smiles and vanished down the passageway.

 _“I should probably be more worried about them,”_ Harry said, glancing down.

 _“But you are not because they are useful.”_ Eriss lifted her body off the ground; he picked her up and she settled around his shoulders while he pulled out the Map and checked it again. Filch and Umbridge were ensconced securely in Filch’s office still. Clever move on her part—getting Filch on her side. He slipped out of the passage under a Notice-Me-Not.

Pansy threw open the door to the study. “Fishy took the bait!”

Harry looked up, distracted. “What are we fishing for?”

“Goblins,” she said, smirking, as she strode inside and tossed a parchment on his desk. While he unrolled the message, she grabbed her chair, waiting off to one side, and pulled it up with a smug expression.

Harry read the letter and smiled very slowly. The Silvertooth goblin clan had, at Stonemace’s suggestion, found the patent for their journal design valuable enough to participate in Harry’s little scheme. “Excellent news,” he said. “Where’s Blaise? Theo?”

“I briefed Blaise in the common room. Under spells, don’t worry. He’s busy with a thing for his mum, wouldn’t say what, so I left him to it.” Pansy shrugged. “Not sure about Theo but you can catch him up later.”

“Luna?”

“Her cousin twice removed something something I don’t remember does in fact exist and will definitely tell the Ministry under Veritaserum that he never sent us anything.”

Harry nodded. “Even better because it’s all true.”

“The best lies are based in fact,” Pansy agreed, flicking through the papers on his desk. “This all looks horribly boring. Your tutor?”

“Yes,” Harry said with a sigh. “And it’s not actually boring.”

“He must be a hard master.” She shot him a knowing look.

“Indeed,” Harry said, smirking back. Someone had probably told Pansy or hinted who his extracurricular tutor was, although Barty had been coming only once a week since the holidays ended, citing a temporary increase in his other duties.

“Shall we give them the go-ahead on the fake evidence?” Pansy said, already reaching for a quill.

“Do it.” Harry cracked his knuckles. “I’ll have, oh, Aaron confiscate Luna’s fake journal soon, and from there the rest of ours…”

“Don’t you just love how much goblins enjoy fucking over the Ministry?” Pansy said with a happy sigh.

Harry pictured the chaos and grinned. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.”

“Mr. Black?”

Harry blinked and looked up. “Yes, Professor?”

McGonagall peered disapprovingly down her nose at him. “We were discussing the theory behind animate conjuration. Not the implications of Fibonacci patterns in potion-making.” She looked pointedly at the book open on his table next to _An Intermediate Guide to Transfiguration._

“Sorry, Professor,” he said, closing _The Unnoticed Patterns of Potion-brewing_ with a contrite smile.

Her nostrils flared ever so slightly. “And?”

Some of the Hufflepuffs winced. Draco was smirking ever so slightly. “I’m sorry, Professor, I don’t follow.”

“What was the last thing I spoke of?” 

Harry called up his memories of the last few minutes. A few phrases stuck out. Enough for him to make a good guess. “Goiter’s experiments in temporary conjurations of biotic material. The power level to keep a construct in existence for the same amount of time increases with each degree of complexity.”

“Indeed. Conjure an animated construct of sixth-degree complexity that will last at minimum ten minutes, Mr. Black.”

Harry was still thinking about using Fibonacci patterns to modify Polyjuice past its current one-hour-per-dose limit. Each batch took a long time to brew and it could only be tested on humans, which meant it was unusually difficult to experiment with…

McGonagall. Right. “Yes, Professor,” he said, flicking his wand into his hand. Sixth-degree complexity was the first to include vertebrates. He pictured a good-sized rat. The wand motions were pretty ingrained as muscle memory by now. _“Animatus conjures_ ,” he said.

Magic channeled out of his wand. A second later, a rat almost the length of his forearm sat on his desk.

Several Puffs gasped. Harry blinked at them, then at Theo, who was subtly facepalming behind McGonagall’s back, and Pansy, who was rolling her eyes, and Draco, who just looked annoyed.

McGonagall pursed her lips. Harry swallowed a grin; she hated when he outperformed Jules. Saw it as an affront to Gryffindor or something. She waved her wand over the rat, probably checking on the magic in it to see how long it would last. Harry had pumped enough magic in there to maintain the construct for somewhere between ten and twelve minutes, so she couldn’t call him on anything and had to walk away with an irritated expression.

He tuned out her lecture. Opening the Potions book again would probably get him in trouble but he could think about what he’d read, and Fibonacci spirals in stirring patterns held a lot of potential to modify Polyjuice…

Shuffling feet warned him that class was ending. Harry stuffed his books back into his expanded bag. He could show Theo his ideas over lunch.

“That was really cool, Harry.”

Theo snickered. Harry frowned at him. “Thanks, Hannah.”

The Hufflepuff girl looked at him questioningly.

“What?” Harry said, annoyed.

“We aren’t supposed to be able to do six-degree animate conjurations yet,” Theo said, smirking evilly.

Oh. Fuck. Harry closed his eyes momentarily. “She was trying to humiliate me for not paying attention.”

“I will _forever_ treasure the look on her face when you pulled off a perfect _animatus conjurus_ ,” Blaise said dreamily.

Hannah looked between them. “Harry, where did you learn that?”

“I work ahead a lot,” he said, smiling at her. “Especially in McGongall’s, she’s not fond of me.”

“Oh, okay. Well, good job,” Hannah said with a grin. “See you tomorrow.”

“See you,” Pansy called after her as she walked away with the other Hufflepuffs. Macmillan shot Harry an unhappy glare over his shoulder.

“Well, you slipped up,” Daphne said.

Harry frowned at her.

Rumors of the episode in Transfiguration spread quickly, at least among the upper years. Harry got interested glances from older Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws, and Slytherins, especially Slytherins outside the Vipers. He ignored them, having plenty of practice with people staring. At least this time it was for something more or less positive instead of press allegations that he was mad.

“This is what you get,” Pansy said gleefully.

“Oh, fuck this,” Harry muttered, finishing his lunch. “We’re free this afternoon. I’ll be downstairs brewing.” He had to start a new batch of Veritaserum antidote today; they were running low. It also wouldn’t hurt to have some Polyjuice on hand, and with plenty of healing potions waiting for blood additions to clear up Umbridge’s Blood Quill marks, he had a free cauldron.

Intermittent explosions came from inside Fred and George’s mad scientist chamber. Harry didn’t know if they were being productive or blowing things up to relieve stress. He looked at the door for a few seconds and decided not to ask.

**ETHAN THORNE, BARRISTER AND FRIEND OF LORD JAMES POTTER, ARRESTED FOR USE OF BLOOD MAGIC**

_Ethan Thorne, thirty-four-year-old Law Master, has been arrested by the Auror Corps on charges of using illegal blood magic on minors, says an anonymous Ministry source._

_“I can’t give details as of yet, the investigation’s not complete,” one source told Daily Prophet correspondent Chris Kyle. “But I can say that highly illegal blood magic was involved, and that the case doesn’t look good for Thorne.”_

_Most readers will know Ethan Thorne as the Potter proxy on the Wizengamot and the Potters’ legal representative, as well as Lord James Potter’s best friend. “He was involved at every step of the disinheritance case in 1995,” recalls Orla Gambol, Assistant Deputy Head of the Wizengamot’s Legal Advisory and Research Department. “And when Potter went on trial for neglect and all that after the Black case was closed, Thorne was in here every day, seemed like.”_

_Details are hazy at this time but if rumors are to be believed, Thorne used blood magic, and this correspondent’s Ministry contact hinted that the attack was aimed at a minor or group of minors. Blood magic of all kinds has been illegal in the United Magical Kingdom since the comprehensive 1803 ban on dangerous magics, spearheaded by Artemisia Lufkin, first female Minister of Magic. Lufkin, backed by the now-defunct Progressive Magic Party (PMP), pushed the comprehensive bill through the Wizengamot, citing the potential for blood magics and other branches of Dark Arts to be used for evil was too great. The party’s central platform involved acknowledgement of Muggle technological advancements, and a key plank of Lufkin’s preelection talking points was banning blood magic. Much of the PMP’s progress was undone by Josephina Flint, Minister of Magic 1819-1827, but every Minister since Lufkin who tried to take down the 1803 ban has failed._

**For an in-depth history of blood magic and relevant legislation, see page 5.**

**For a biography of Ethan Thorne and detailed coverage of his various court cases, see page 11.**

**For a look back at the Black, Potter, and Dumbledore trials, as well as the disinheritance of the child now known as Heir Hadrian Black, and the roles of Ethan Thorne in each, see page 17.**

Harry folded the Prophet with precise motions and set it next to his plate. Then he went back to eating breakfast.

“Well?” Blaise said, eyeing him. Harry’s back was to the wall, meaning the whole Great Hall could see all his facial expressions. Including Jules, over at the lions’ table, who hadn’t opened his paper yet. Blaise sat with his back to them and could afford to be a bit less cautious.

Carefully, he adopted an expression of upset and confusion for the Gryffindors’ benefit. “Do we know this Chris Kyle?”

“Father’s partner knows him, loosely. So do the Malfoys,” Daphne said, leaning around Theo at Harry’s right. Her voice dropped. “He’s… affiliated.”

Silent communication rippled around the group. Message sent and received.

Hestia, Adrian, Flora, Everett, and Noah tended to sit on the side of Harry’s group opposite the staff table. The year-group seating order had gotten a bit disrupted lately, with some seventh years and third years mingling with Harry’s immediate circle, who stayed in the fifth years’ usual place. So far Harry didn’t think any non-Slytherins had noticed. Their seating order wasn’t a thing other Houses copied. From this position, it was easy for Hestia to catch his eye and tap the paper.

He raised an eyebrow.

She nodded slightly.

Harry pasted an aggressively innocent mask onto his face.

Hestia laughed lightly and returned to her previous conversation.

“You didn’t arrange this, did you?” Blaise said, fluttering his own copy of the Prophet slightly to get Harry’s attention.

“Nope.” He’d known there’d be media backlash, but this included more of an anti-Thorne bias than Harry had expected with so little information. Possibly Thorne just wasn’t well liked—the man was an unctuous sleazeball, after all—but if he was _affiliated_ …

Pansy and Daphne swapped a conspiratorial look. “I have it on good authority that this little piece was leaked out yesterday,” Pansy said. “Certain circles greatly enjoyed it, and encouraged Kyle.”

That explained it. Harry smirked very slightly. So nice when that his enemy’s other enemies jumped on board this little crusade. He hadn’t even asked, so technically there was no favor owed.

Justin ditched Hannah in Herbology as soon as the Slytherins walked in. Harry saw him disengage from the clot of badgers and elbowed Theo, who split to work with a different group.

Theo’s fake put-upon sigh was still fading when Justin took his place next to Draco across from Harry and Blaise. Harry knew Theo wouldn’t be disappointed: he was not fond of the Malfoy heir.

“Sooo,” Justin said in an undertone as they attacked their Dissolving Devilweed. “Did you bribe the reporter?”

“Nope,” Harry said.

Draco grinned. “He’s just not overly fond of Ethan Thorne.”

“What are you doing with this, Harry?” Justin said. “Just getting him off the field?’

Harry shook his head. “I’ll be surprised if they actually convict him.” His voice was equally soft. Herbology was always chaotic and a great time to talk unheard, especially with the sound-canceling wards he’d cast around their table as soon as he put his bag down. “Reputation blow…”

“And something else.” Justin grinned at the look on Blaise and Draco’s faces. “You lot really need to stop underestimating me ‘cause I’m a Puff. Look, Harry’s not surprised I worked it out.”

“Have you sorted out what _it_ is?” Harry said, smirking. It was _always_ amusing when Slytherins forgot how cunning Justin could be.

Justin worked on the Dissolving Devilweed for a few minutes in silence. Just as well; the plant tended to spit very noxious acid when annoyed, hence its name.

 _“Oh,”_ Justin said, very suddenly.

Sprout happened to be walking behind him. “Oh what, Mr. Finch-Fletchley?” she said with a bright smile for him, a warm one for Harry, and then a lukewarm glance over Blaise and Theo.

“I just realized the answer to an interesting question Harry asked a minute ago,” Justin said easily. He held up a bowl full of the acid secretions; it was made of corundum, one of the only substances the acid didn’t attack. “Corundum can react to magic and corrode human tissue—does the acid not react to the corundum because it has such similar magical properties?”

“Five points to Hufflepuff for the insight,” Sprout said with a brisk nod. “And three to Slytherin for a clever question. Carry on, boys.”

She bustled off to stop Sophie Roper getting acid sprayed in her eyes. Harry wouldn’t have bothered.

“Thanks for the points, Justin,” Blaise said with a straight face.

“Where’d you learn to lie like that?” Draco said.

Justin grinned. “Technically I didn’t, she just assumed the thing about corundum was a response to Harry’s question. I read that last night.”

Harry grinned back. “This is why we’re friends.”

“Well, Justin?” Blaise said with an anticipatory gleam in his eye. “Stop beating around the tree.”

Harry choked on air and almost dumped a bowl of acid on himself.

Blaise and Draco both looked at him oddly. “You all right there?” Draco said sneeringly.

“Yes,” Harry said. He definitely wouldn’t be correcting Blaise on that apparently Muggle idiom anytime soon. Justin’s expression was sunny and innocent and gave nothing away but it had almost definitely been him.

Justin cleared his throat dramatically. “Wellll… you’re setting public opinion of the Potters and their allies against the public opinion on blood magic.”

“In one,” Harry said, mock toasting him with the bowl of acid still in his hand.

Draco nodded along. He hadn’t been told of the plan, not in detail, but there was a definite smirk on his face and he didn’t look pissed to have been kept out of the loop. “The Potters’ reputation is already weakened from the trials,” he mused. “So this could either make Potter dump Thorne as deadweight, and show his true colors… or be forced to argue that blood magic’s not always as awful as the Ministry says it is.”

“That article was definitely a little more antagonistic than I’d expect with how little they know,” Justin said, looking between Harry and Draco. “They’ve been attacking Jules as an unstable nut job but the trials have gotten waylaid by more recent stories, and Thorne’s never been dragged through the mud.”

“Interesting observation,” Blaise drawled.

Harry shrugged lightly. “A third-party influence may have spoken to the reporter. _I_ had nothing to do with that. Serendipity I suppose…”

“Enemy of my enemy,” Justin agreed.

Harry was quite sure he wasn’t imagining the pleased smirk on Draco’s face.

“Do you need something to tell them?”

Harry looked between Pansy, Theo, Hestia, and Everett. “Tell who?”

“Don’t be coy,” Hestia said.

“I don’t _need_ anything,” Harry said. He’d been passing on trivial and seemingly useful information once or twice a week, none of it really meaningful but enough to seem like he was trying. “But if you’ve an idea…”

“Something’s about to happen,” Pansy said, examining her fingernails. Astrych sat at her feet and fixed his creepy black eyes on Eriss, who was coiled on the sofa next to Harry.

Theo smirked very faintly. “Something big.”

“Tomorrow,” Everett said.

“And how will I look after passing on this information?” Harry said, settling back into the chair he’d begun to think of as _his_. This had just been a normal evening in the common room until Hestia and Everett came over from the upper years’ court nearby and chased Graham, Vasily, and Astoria away with nothing but a cool look from Hestia. Theo and Pansy hadn’t seemed surprised in the slightest by the intrusion.

“Good,” Everett promised.

Harry looked at Theo and waited for his nod.

“What _is_ going to happen?” he said, already pulling out his (real) journal, and not the one that had been confiscated by a stern-faced Auror wannabe from the DMLE’s Search and Confiscation Division the day the Thorne article came out. Irritatingly, there had been no new information since, though the tabloids and Prophet were going crazy. Then again it had only been three days since his arrest. 

Three days in which he had a session with Barty and received a very roundabout compliment on the Thorne Affair.

Several silent questions and answers flicked between his senior Vipers while Harry crafted a quick message to Jules. “Something big,” Theo repeated finally, glaring at Pansy and Hestia, who’d apparently put their feet down. “Plausible deniability and all.”

“We don’t actually know what,” Pansy said, and Harry revised his interpretation. That was Theo being pissed in general that none of them had been let in on the secret.

“Well, our mail’s probably getting searched,” he said idly. “Figures they wouldn’t write you lot letters detailing their dastardly plans. How’s this look?”

The others leaned forward as he flipped the journal around and showed them the draft.

_HB_

_I don’t have anything conclusive but—Jules, something big is about to go down. Not sure what exactly. I keep seeing Malfoy and the Carrows and Fawley talking and Theo’s being cagey. I wouldn’t have anything more than a suspicion but he feels guilty about keeping secrets; he let slip some comment about tomorrow being crazy._

“Looks good,” Pansy said.

Everett nodded. “The scrawled handwriting is a nice touch.”

“I know,” Harry said, copying the message onto Jules’ bronze page. The chunk of silver pages was a lot thicker now, having been expanded to include every one of the Vipers and unlimited personalized-group pages. The gold one remained only for his original group.

Magic pulsed from the runes anchoring the journal’s enchantments.

Harry closed the journal. “Is that everything? Because I was in the middle of helping the kids with their Transfiguration theory.”

“Sorry to interrupt your lesson, O wise one,” Theo sneered.

Harry grinned at him. “You shouldn’t mock the person who’s kicked your arse on every exam except Herbology since first year.” He paused. “And, you know, that was _only_ our first two years.”

“Oh, fuck you, asshole,” Theo said with a scowl.

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

Theo flipped him off and stalked away with a scowl.

Harry couldn’t wait for the next part of the Thorne exposé. Or the… whatever was to come the next day.

In the common room, nothing was different. Harry was on the alert and saw nothing to suggest any kind of dramatic upheaval in the outside world. Nothing to imply the kind of event Theo’d mentioned.

Then again, it was only morning.

He made sure to give no sign that he was expecting anything out of the ordinary, and noticed four younger students clustered up by the fire with what Harry privately considered the standard Slytherin plotting face. A couple were Vipers, but not all. In fact—he smirked a little—Veronica and Graham appeared to have gotten a few of the firsties together for some therapeutic revenge, who he hadn’t personally met yet. He heard “Gryffindor” and “knee reversal.”

“Knee reversal’s a bit hard to cast sometimes,” he said, pausing. “I find it helps if you add a little extra jab at the end of the wand motion. They never put that one in the books.”

“Thanks, Harry,” Graham said with a mean little smile.

Harry returned it. “If this happens to be aimed at your brother or one of his little cronies, give them a little something extra from me? The Incontinence Jinx is _invesicae_.”

" _Invesicae_ ," one of the firsties mouthed, concentrating. 

"What's your name?" Harry asked. 

The kid looked up. "Oh, er, sorry—Rio Ingham." 

He looked at the other one, eyebrow raised. 

"Yvette Mirren," she said.

“They’re the Muggle-borns of this year,” Veronica said.

“Ah.” Harry raised an eyebrow at her. “Putting together a support group, I see.”

She grinned unrepentantly.

"What's the wand motion for that second one?" Mirren said hesitantly.

"Graham and Veronica know," Harry said. "Just don't practice it on each other. The results are messy. Best of luck." 

“He’s a little scary,” he overheard one of them mutter as he walked away.

“Yeah,” that was Graham, “he can be,” and then Harry was out of earshot.

His smirk lasted all the way up to the entrance hall.

“Move, Borage,” he sneered, “you’re blocking the view.”

This was a ridiculous claim, since this was the entrance hall and one person couldn’t block it unless they were in multiple pieces, but Borage had a permanent spot on his Shit List and Harry never passed up an opportunity to needle her. Or curse her, as it happened, but without an excuse those instances went few and far between.

“I’m not blocking anything, Black,” the older Hufflepuff snapped back at him. “I _am_ the view.”

Harry made a face like he’d just had the world’s biggest epiphany. “Ah, so _that’s_ why I was getting a headache.”

Borage opened her mouth. Harry _tsk_ ed and snapped off two quick spells. One was a _langlock_ and the other just kind of dismissively swept her to the side. She made indignant choking noises as he walked through the specific space she’d just occupied and into the Great Hall.

“Good morning to you, too?” Blaise, somehow already at the table, raised an eyebrow at Harry’s cheerful mood.

“Ran into Borage in the entrance hall,” Harry said, smirking ever so slightly.

“Ahhh,” Blaise said. “Yes, I imagine that’d be an opportunity to either ruin or make your morning.”

Harry smiled and poured himself a mug of tea.

The Great Hall filled gradually. He read a Muggle fiction novel—distaste for Muggles in general hadn’t made him appreciate their fiction any less—while he waited for Theo to arrive.

His best friend seemed a little tense but nothing anyone outside the Vipers’ inner ranks might notice.

“Prophet,” he said softly without prompting.

Harry glanced up. Owl post hadn’t arrived yet. “Hmm,” he said, serving himself oatmeal.

The flurry of wings as the owls poured in didn’t elicit any particular response from the Slytherin table. At least, none that an outsider would notice. Quiet messages passed between certain people in the know, just slightly tightened eye muscles, a certain anticipation tucked into the corners of their smiles. It wasn’t letters or packages but newspapers that the Carrow twins and Theo and Pansy and Draco and Alex and Evalyn and Celesta watched in their peripheral vision. Harry caught Snape’s miniscule glance but couldn’t read surprise or anything else in the potion master’s gaze. Couldn’t tell if the man was surprised or worried or just bracing himself.

Harry really had no fucking clue where the dungeon bat’s loyalties lay. Sighing, he picked up the newspaper Alekta dropped in front of him, fed her a bit of bacon, and froze.

**MASS BREAKOUT FROM AZKABAN**

**MINISTRY FEARS BLACK’S ESCAPE GALVANIZED DEATH EATERS**

_The Ministry of Magic announced late last night that there has been a mass breakout from Azkaban._

_Speaking to reporters in his private office, Cornelius Fudge, Minister of Magic, confirmed that six high-security Death Eater prisoners, fifteen lower-security Death Eaters, and an unconfirmed number of lower-security miscellaneous inmates escaped in the early hours of yesterday evening. Minister Fudge has already informed the Muggle Prime Minister of the dangerous nature of these individuals._

_“We find ourselves, most unfortunately, in a similar position to the one two and a half years ago when Lord Black escaped,” Fudge said last night. “With the unfortunate footnote that none of these prisoners is innocent.”_

_When asked if Lord Black’s escape had anything to do with this one, Fudge seemed hesitant. “Certainly, given Lord Black’s innocence, I doubt he spent much time…_ socializing _with his fellow prisoners. The guards were to tell them that he’d died while the others were asleep. It’s possible they didn’t believe that, in which case I guess they may have been encouraged by knowing escape was even possible.”_

_The escaped high-security Death Eaters include Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange (notorious for the torture and permanent incapacitation of Frank and Alice Longbottom), Augustus Rookwood (former Ministry Unspeakable), Antonin Dolohov (convicted of the brutal double murder of Gideon and Fabian Prewett), Carter Avery, and Septimus Travers._

_“The magnitude of the breakout suggests outside help,” the distinguished Amelia Bones told this reporter early this morning. “Bartemius Crouch Jr.’s ill-conceived attack last year proved there are still Death Eater malcontents at large, and Crouch himself remains uncaptured. It’s possible the escapees have rallied around Crouch, or perhaps Bellatrix Lestrange, Septimus Travers, or Antonin Dolohov—once You-Know-Who’s closest lieutenants—as their leader. We are doing all we can to round up the criminals and we beg the magical community to be alert and cautious. On no account should any of these individuals be approached. Should you see someone you believe to be involved with the escapees, hold your wand and say “DMLE Emergency Sighting” and professional Hitwizards will Apparate to your location.”_

_Fortunately, the emergency prison lockdown and headcount last night revealed that the high-security escapees were Death Eaters only. A number of deranged murderers and serial rapists are currently serving life sentences in Azkaban, including halfblood Ulgar Crafts of Shrewsbury, and all of them remain in their cells._

**For detailed profiles and trial transcripts of each escaped high-security prisoner, see page 5.**

**For a full list of the Death Eaters who escaped, see page 4.**

Harry’s shock was not faked.

It was brilliant. An unprecedented master stroke. Last he checked, going through trial transcripts, there were nineteen Death Eaters in Azkaban. That was almost the entire membership of the Order. And those were only the people _confirmed_ to be Death Eaters; the lower ranks’ Marks didn’t reveal themselves to an outsider unless the person was caught wearing Death Eater robes and mask, or unless an accuser had incontrovertible proof of the accused’s dealings with Riddle. The article specifically didn’t mention how many petty criminals, Death Eaters accused of other crimes, or low-security prisoners had escaped. Harry could just imagine looking at four more years of a five-year sentence, and then being offered freedom to work for Voldemort.

If he spent a year in the care of Dementors, he’d probably take the offer, too.

This was… well, for one thing, proof that Riddle wasn’t too far gone to show loyalty to his people in return for the loyalty they gave him. A good sign. If he was insane enough to leave them in prison there was no way Harry could ever negotiate with him if it came to that.

He remembered to fake horror along with his very real shock.

Celesta looked up. Her eyes fixed on nothing in particular, and her back was to the rest of the school, so only Slytherins could see the burning triumph that flared there for a few seconds.

Draco’s knuckles turned white with his hidden grip on the edge of his chair.

Down the table a bit, Ginny had her arm around Natalie’s shoulders; Harry remembered that Natalie’s mum had been in Azkaban. Evalyn sat with them as usual and her eyes looked like chips of ice. For her, it was an uncle, Septimus Travers.

Alex Rowle steadily began eating his breakfast. If you weren’t sitting at precisely the right angle, you’d never notice the tremor in his hands as he lifted a goblet of pumpkin juice.

Angry shouts and gasps started rippling through the rest of the school. Harry willed himself to get a bit pale and sat back in his seat as if the thought of food disgusted him, mind spinning a thousand miles a second. Ticking off Slytherins who had relatives who probably just escaped.

Evalyn. Natalie. Alex, his aunt, uncle, and father. Celesta, an older brother and a cousin. The Carrow twins, a cousin. Bulstrode, her mother. Iris, her father—she was the only non-Slytherin on the list. Draco’s aunt and uncle.

Once people read that list, it was going to be war on Slytherin.

At the staff table, Sprout was reading the Prophet so intently she appeared not to notice the gentle drip of egg yolk falling into her lap. Dumbledore and McGonagall were talking with grave expressions. Snape’s attention was on the Slytherins, and unreadable. Umbridge steadily ate her way through a bowl of porridge but she couldn’t hide her scowl, or the glares she kept sending Dumbledore’s direction.

Something drew his attention back to the Gryffindor table. Harry scanned its length. Fred and George were absent, which was slightly concerning. Even more concerning were the absolutely vicious glares some Gryffindors were starting to aim at the Slytherin table.

Including Jules.

Although his anger included betrayal and worry when he looked at Harry.

Harry looked back expressionlessly for a few seconds and returned to his breakfast. “Pass the word along,” he murmured so only the people sitting immediately around him could hear. “Third years and below travel in groups of three at minimum. Upper years don’t go anywhere alone.”

There was a sudden flurry of activity at the Gryffindor table. Attention swung to Neville, sitting with Hermione and Dean, as he shouted something at Ben Creed that went unheard in the noise before storming out.

Harry looked back down at Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange’s photographs. Both were gaunt and Azkaban-haunted, a look he was all too familiar with from Sirius. They’d both been attractive people once but the dementors had stripped that away. Rodolphus leaned on the edge of his frame with a nasty sneer and Bellatrix alternated between making faces at the camera and dramatically sighing in the corner like a damsel in distress.

_Convicted of the torture and permanent incapacitation of Frank and Alice Longbottom._

The Gryffindors had gotten a bit quiet in Neville’s wake. Harry looked at the still-closing doors of the Great Hall. He felt a bit odd.

Neville didn’t know the identity of Harry’s tutor. Didn’t know Harry had been training for months now with one of the people who was there for his parents’ torture.

Harry had known, objectively, that Barty had been involved. His time in Azkaban had been too short to really ravage him like Sirius and the Lestranges, so it was easy to see traces of the teenager from the old Prophet photos in his face.

It just hadn’t mattered. He was an opportunity to learn and get stronger.

Hopefully Neville would never find out, because Harry didn’t think he’d be quite so good at setting aside his vendetta.

It was worse than the Heir of Slytherin disaster.

Hisses, invectives, insults, and curses both magical and metaphorical stalked the Slytherins through the corridors. No one could retreat to the common room because hiding from the public eye would invite suspicion, so they shouldered the stares and anger and went about their day with icy masks. Even the firsties were handling it pretty well.

 _“Death Eater spawn_ ,” someone snarled at Theo on their way out of Charms.

“Ten points from Gryffindor,” Flitwick squeaked. The third year who’d said it scowled but scampered off. Harry made a note of Flitwick’s attempt at fairness. He was one of few teachers who’d even been trying lately, with Vector, Babbling, Sinistra, and Binns. Although Binns hardly counted, since he never seemed to notice his students at all, let alone to take or give points.

Messages telegraphed from one Slytherin to another, a silent flow of communication hidden in quick glances and miniscule head shakes and questions posed to teachers at the right moment to head off an argument. _Be careful_ , they told each other. _Be quiet. Don’t draw attention, don’t take the bait, be discreet, watch your words._

 _Do you need help?_ they asked each other, and _want me to run him off?_ and _how are the teachers responding?_

It was the first time Harry had ever _appreciated_ Umbridge’s horrific Defense classes. At least under her, no one dared whisper _“Murdering snake_ ” or “ _slimy Slytherin”_ whenever they answered a question.

Returning to the common room was a relief. “House meeting,” Adrian said tersely when Harry stepped inside, “don’t go anywhere,” and Harry nodded. A group of official and unofficial House leaders were congregating by the fireplace; Celesta had saved an empty chair to her left. She caught Harry’s eye and jerked her head towards it. He settled easily in as the only fifth year in the group.

Theo showed up and smirked at Harry before making a beeline for the fifth years’ usual circle of seats.

Lillian Pym hobbled inside five minutes later, sobbing and covered in welts from head to toe. Blaise was on his feet in a second, beating Lillian’s friends Tyler Redwood and Liza Marks to her side. “What happened?” he demanded.

“H-Hufflepuffs,” she said, breath coming in short, pained gasps. “I—dunno who.”

Everett and Harry swapped a glance; Everett waved Blaise over. He towed Pym into the group of older students. She looked around them uncertainly.

“Hospital wing?” Celesta said.

Harry shook his head as Adrian said, “No way—with how things are Pomfrey might just blame one of _us_.”

“Can’t show weakness” came from the seething clot of students forming around them.

“Rayburn and Chapman?” Harry said.

Hestia nodded. “Shawna, Katherine.”

“Not what I thought I’d be using Healer training for,” seventh-year Chapman snarled, pulling her wand and setting to work. The welts visible through tears in Pym’s robes began to fade. “Bloody fucking badgers.”

Harry dug in one of his expanded pockets. It never hurt to keep supplies on hand…

His fingers closed around a small vial. He checked its contents before tossing it to Pym. “Pain relief,” he said.

She knocked it back without hesitation.

The potion kicked in within seconds. Her body relaxed so much that it became obvious how hard she’d been fighting to stay still. Impressive pain tolerance for a second year.

“That worked fast,” Rayburn said critically.

Harry shrugged one shoulder. “I may have made some modifications.”

“Potions Master in the making?” Chapman said nastily.

Harry smiled back, perfectly polite. “Snape thinks so.”

Chapman blinked. Backed down.

“What do we do?” Peregrine said. He was mostly only sitting in this group because he was Everett’s best friend and right hand.

“What we always do,” Flora said. “Look after our own.”

“We might not just be able to weather this storm,” Everett said. The rest of the House talked quietly; students were still trickling in from dinner and the library. No one would be stupid enough to stay outside the dungeons for long. “Today was…”

“We have at least eight people with family members in that breakout,” Celesta said. _Including you_ , Harry thought. “The school will be reading our mail and—Circe, some of the _first years_ got attacked today.”

“So much for the Light’s moral high ground,” Adrian growled.

Harry shifted his weight very slightly. It was enough to draw his Vipers’ attention and that in turn got the other upper years’ attention even though they didn’t know why. “I can arrange communication for those with family members in the breakout,” he said.

Silence descended. The Vipers knew how. The others didn’t.

“Black…” Chapman eyed him. “We’re supposed to trust you with that?”

It was Hestia’s measuring gaze Harry met.

“I will,” Hestia said.

Adrian shrugged. “Same. Celesta?”

“Obviously,” Celesta sneered.

Chapman looked around them. “…all right. That’s the mail issue solved, then. We still have the attacks to deal with.”

“Travel in groups,” Harry said. “Minimum four to a pack for third years and below, two or three to a group for fourth years and up.”

“Rayburn, Chapman, you’ll have your work cut out for you in the next few days,” Hestia said grimly. “We won’t be going to the hospital wing unless we absolutely have to.”

“I can supply healing potions,” Harry said.

Rayburn frowned. “Brewed here?”

He raised an eyebrow and silently dared her to press that issue.

“Never mind. I appreciate it.” She eyed him. “Can you do blood-based for more severe injuries?”

“Why d’you think his Muggle-born friends haven’t gotten scars from detentions with the hag?” Everett said.

Both Healers squinted at him. Harry smiled back at them, with teeth. They looked away.

Hestia rubbed at her forehead. “The group-travel rule Harry started this morning is official. We could even increase it to groups of four for third years and below.”

“I agree,” Chapman said. “Off you go, Pym. Get some sleep.”

“Thank you,” Pym said, still pale, and Blaise slipped away in their wake. Draco and Pansy came into the common room together and took the couch he’d been sitting on.

Harry flicked a glance over the rest of his House. They were clearly waiting for the impromptu leaders’ conference to finish, and unlike the Gryffindors, their rage was high intensity and low volume. A cauldron full of poison about to boil over.

“One other thing,” he said. “The castle snakes will serve as our lookouts.”

This was an even bigger bombshell than the fact that he could brew blood-based healing potions. Harry hadn’t even told most of the Vipers that he could get into the Chamber because he was the Heir, not because of being a Parselmouth. Speaking to snakes alone wouldn’t be enough.

“They’re snakes,” sixth year Jarred Seaton said. He was quiet and intelligent and pretty much scared the other students into leaving him alone, and he was constantly in detention even though they could never catch him outright, and Harry had never tried to reach out to him for the simple reason that he was pretty sure Seaton was a clinical sociopath. “There’s a reason we have a reputation for being backstabbing little shits. Can we trust your snakes, Black?”

 _There’s the sociopath_ , Harry thought. He smiled again with no kindness in it. “They will.”

“Black,” Celesta said slowly, “Parselmouths can speak to snakes. Not command them.”

Harry didn’t respond.

 _“Slytherin’s Heir_ can command the Hogwarts serpents,” Celesta said.

No one missed the way Blaise’s eyes very, very briefly flicked towards Harry.

Hestia examined him for a few seconds. “Okay. The snakes will act as our lookouts. How will that work?”

“I’ll speak to them,” Harry said. “Best guess, if you see a snake sitting in the middle of a hallway, don’t keep walking. They’re warning you off of continuing that direction. Not all of them understand English well so just find a different route to wherever you need to go. We should all know the secret passageways well at this point.”

“I like it,” Adrian said. “Hestia, do the honors?”

The prefects plus Chapman, Rayburn, Seaton, Harry, and Everett all shifted so they were facing the common room as a whole. Harry noted with some amusement that the seat Celesta had saved for him was the only single-person armchair in the group of furniture they’d claimed.

Hestia stood. “Slytherin House!” she called, voice ringing over the assembled students.

The house had been waiting. Silence fell immediately. Harry raked his gaze over the assembled Slytherins, assessing. Years of war had left the student population smaller than it once was, and while the first and second forms were showing the post-war population boom, they still had only between eighty and ninety Slytherins. It didn’t feel like that many until all of them were in one place like this, fixed on a common issue.

“Nothing of tonight’s events will go beyond Slytherin and our allies,” Hestia said flatly. _Allies_ was a nice little loophole. Technically, the Vipers counted as allies.

“Obviously,” someone called from the third years. “Rule seven.”

Wordless agreement swept through the common room.

“Firstly: we have a tacit rule to travel in groups. That rule is now officially rule eight,” Hestia said. “Third years and below will not be seen outside the classroom, Great Hall, or common room in a group of fewer than four people.”

“Can they be non-Slytherins?” That was Astoria. Harry remembered that she and Romilda had been befriending Charlie Spangle of Gryffindor and Dylan Worple of Hufflepuff in their year, both casual members of the dueling club and victims of bullying in their Houses.

“And what about meetings with professors?” one of the second-years called.

Adrian didn’t bother to stand up. “Trusted non-Slytherins are fine. Use your judgment. For meetings with professors, if it’s Snape you’re fine. Otherwise, have the rest of your group hang out nearby and join them when you’re done, or find an upper year to take you there and back. Try to pick a sixth year.”

“Second thing,” Hestia said. “Those of you who have family members in that breakout—should you wish to contact them, we have a way. Stay behind when the House meeting is over.”

Interest perked up after that statement, as did the tension. Celesta twirled a bit of hair around her finger.

“Taking advantage of this opportunity, or not, neither condones nor denounces what your family members may have done,” Chapman said coolly. Good caveat. “And only family members will be able to pass messages through us. If anyone, for whatever reason, needs to contact one of the escapees that they are not related to, give it to that person’s nearest family member for approval. If that person doesn’t have a family member here, tough luck.”

“Finally.” Hestia lifted her chin. “Courtesy of Black, we have a built-in warning system.”

She stepped aside, looking pointedly at Harry.

He hid his surprise and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “The castle snakes owe their allegiance to House Slytherin,” he said, pitching his voice so that everyone could hear him clearly, but they had to be pretty much dead silent to do so. It was a trick he’d copied off Snape. Not that he would ever admit it. “They will watch over those of us in Slytherin, particularly the younger students. Should you see a live snake in a hallway, particularly when on your own, take it as a warning sign and find a different route, or just come back to the common room.”

Surprised whispers broke out immediately. “ _House Slytherin_ ,” and “ _Black?”_ and “ _You don’t think…”_ and “ _was it the Potter line or the Blacks?”_ and _“Not the Blacks, they wouldn’t keep that advantage a secret_ ” and _“Well, it would be very Slytherin…”_

He thought he heard _“Dark Lord”_ in there a few times too, but he might’ve been imagining that.

“Enough,” Hestia snapped. People shut up immediately, but Harry could feel the sharpened interest aimed at him.

Adrian opened his mouth, probably to dismiss the group, but Harry cut him off. “One more thing.”

Adrian closed his mouth with a _click_.

“If anyone is particularly… irksome… about this, come see me or one of the prefects,” Harry said, aiming this at the younger kids. The older set could probably handle it themselves but second years going after seventh wouldn’t end well, and less than half of the firsties and second years were in the Vipers. On the other hand, all the prefects were his, and that was unofficial rule.

Slytherin looks out for its own.

Plenty of malicious grins and approving nods were visible throughout the House.

“Rule seven,” Hestia reminded them all. “Study hard, stay at the tops of your classes, and _be careful_.”

The House meeting broke up immediately into swirling groups of students. Simmering outrage bounced from one to the other and only got stronger as it went. Harry and the other House leaders, official and unofficial, sat in silence for a few minutes, just watching the currents.

“It’s going to be open season tomorrow,” he said. “Worse than today.”

“It’ll have sunk in,” Celesta agreed.

Adrian muttered a swear word. “I’m drinking tonight, who’s coming?”

“Ward your dorm,” Harry advised, standing. “I’d rather not hear the explosions if you lot drown your control in alcohol.”

“You’d better have Zabini do the same,” Adrian snarled, but it was an empty threat and they could all tell. Harry waved a sardonic goodbye. Pansy and Draco followed him back to the other fifth years without comment.

“Booze?” Blaise offered, looking at the group of seventh years trooping into the boys’ dorms behind Adrian. “I have better than what Pucey’s got.”

Draco made a face. “Please, I can’t stand that swill of Goyle’s.”

“You’ve been drinking _Goyle’s_ shit?” Pansy demanded. “Idiot.”

“Father won’t send me any,” Draco complained. “What with the post under watch.”

“And you haven’t figured out a smuggling route by now?” Theo said incredulously. “Just buy it in Hogsmeade and stick it in a shrinking box.” 

Draco flushed.

“Come on over if you want to drink, I’ll ward our dorm,” Harry said before things could deteriorate farther.

Theo grinned at the girls. “Ladies?”

“No need to ask again,” Pansy said. Daphne nodded; her mask was slipping just a little. She looked tired.

Somehow Goyle, Crabbe, and Bulstrode ended up joining the little party. So did Celesta and Jordan, and then Noah stumbled in with the tiny fourth-year group in tow, and then Everett showed up with bottles of illegal American moonshine claiming that the seventh years were pansies who couldn’t handle _real_ alcohol. Before Harry knew it he had almost all the Vipers above fourth year getting shitfaced in his dorm. He sighed, kept himself to sips of firewhiskey (although the moonshine was really something), and monitored the situation from his bed. Slytherins normally kept their drinking to a minimum and that in private; the loss of control was too risky in front of large audiences. You never knew what your drunk self might accidentally reveal. Tonight they mostly bitched about other Houses and biased teachers. At one point, Everett made a slightly slurred comment about the bloody Dark Lord’s shitty timing that had everyone in stitches even though it wasn’t actually funny.

Finn Sullivan tried to set off a crate of fireworks. In the dorm room. Harry vanished them and took his wand, overriding the kid’s complaints with a glare. Even drunk, Finn had the sense to back off when he saw that expression.

He ended up having to take all their wands except Theo’s, Evalyn’s, Alex’s, and Daphne’s.

“Do we let them stay?” Theo asked, looking around. Ginny, Pansy, Bulstrode, and Natalie had passed out in a pile on Pansy’s bed, fashion magazines and Dark Arts books from Pansy’s trunk strewn around them. Draco was likewise snoring in his own bed. Blaise had made it back to his bed too but Crabbe and Goyle were both unconscious on the floor. Noah, Jordan, and Celesta had stolen Goyle’s bed and Everett was propped up against it, drooling in his sleep.

“I am way too tired to haul them all back to their own rooms,” Harry said flatly. “Toss up some silencers and leave them.”

“Why silencers?” Evalyn said.

On cue, Crabbe started snoring.

She winced.

Harry stared at Crabbe for a minute. Maybe he was a little drunker than he’d thought, because usually he wasn’t bothered by being around the boy whose father he’d killed. But now he was caught staring and remembering Crabbe Sr.’s face in the pictures. It was a lot like his son’s, if older and even more firmly set in scowling lines.

Maybe _bother_ was the wrong word for this sick fascination. _Bother_ indicated—regret. Some kind of inability to let it go. He’d done that. His brain just wouldn’t stop superimposing the father’s face over the son’s and wondering whether Vincent Crabbe hated him.

“He knows it was you.”

Harry startled a little, looking at Evalyn.

“I overheard him,” she elaborated. She’d knocked back some of Everett’s moonshine like it was nothing and earned a gleam of respect from the older boy in doing so. “Talking to Goyle. He knows it was you.”

“Do I need to look out for a metaphorical knife in the spine?” he said tiredly.

“Always,” Evalyn said. “You’re Harry Black. But not from him.”

He stared at her for a few seconds. There was nothing but truth in her eyes and she seemed a little too drunk to lie well, so he went with it. “Take… ah, here,” he said, flicking his wand and conjuring a cot. It took two tries. “Daph?”

“I’m fine,” Daphne said, conjuring a cot of her own.

Theo mumbled something about hoping someone had Hangover Cure for the morning and vanished behind his own bed curtains.

Harry unraveled the wards on Theo’s trunk, borrowed his camera, and took several photographs of his passed-out Vipers. The shot of Celesta, Noah, Jordan, and Everett was particularly amusing, as was the sight of Ginny, Nat, Pansy, and Bulstrode in one tangled heap. And, of course, Draco Malfoy with messy hair, unkempt robes, and actual drool coming out of his mouth.

It was always good to have minor blackmail like this.

Harry popped out the film when he was done and replaced it with a fresh roll before locking Theo’s trunk back up exactly how it had been. He’d send the pictures off to get developed at the next Hogsmeade trip. If nothing else they’d be great for a laugh.

Hopefully the house-elves could fix the scorch marks and miniature craters in the walls.


	3. Ch 17

Everyone was plagued by headaches the next morning. Even Harry, because he didn’t drink much and had a low tolerance. He found the stock of Hangover Cure in stasis jars he’d kept from the holidays and passed them out before anyone left the room.

They neatened their robes, the girls sneaked back to their own dorms, and everyone showed up at the common room only half an hour late. They were well ahead of the rest of the House. Snape was standing by the entrance with a long-suffering expression and a cauldron of Hangover Cure.

“Ah, so some of you had the sense to abstain,” Snape drawled.

Harry glanced over the boys; Pansy, Daphne, and the other girls would be a little behind since their hair took longer. Everett, Draco, Blaise, Goyle, Crabbe, Theo, Noah, and Jordan were all perfectly put together. “Yes, sir,” he said.

“That’s exactly what happened,” Jordan agreed, throwing an arm around Noah’s shoulders. Laughing, the two of them jostled each other on their way out of the common room.

“Had nothing to do with one of us having the sense to stock up on a certain useful potion,” Everett said with a smirk.

Harry returned it. “See you in class, sir.”

“You’d best have a quality essay for me,” Snape threatened.

“I will.” Barty had assigned it.

Speaking of which…

But no, that could wait for their session the next day.

Harry braced himself for the Great Hall.

It was, as he’d predicted, worse than the day before. Two Slytherins, five Gryffindors, and a Hufflepuff ended up in the hospital wing, both Slytherins dragged there by a teacher who witnessed the incident. Slytherins plotted revenge with determined anger instead of cheerful mischief.

People got drunk again that evening. Harry put his shrunken trunk into his pocket and conjured a bed in one of the abandoned back rooms of the boys’ dorm so he could sleep in peace.

Neville waved a newspaper in Harry’s face. “Can you explain this?”

“You were here when we planned it,” Harry said, confused.

Pansy rolled her eyes and looked up from her cauldron. They were down in the Chamber laboratory and she’d taken the time to do a remedial Potions assignment Snape set her after a failure in the last class. He’d never scold a snake in front of the Gryffindors but he would and _did_ hold her back and make it very clear that he expected a passable Skin-Growth Salve on his desk on Friday. “He wasn’t listening, Harry, remember? That was the day his Gran sent that weird plant they found up in like, Siberia or something.”

“Do plants even grow in Siberia?” Justin asked. “Harry, what’s this annotation on the Veritaserum antidote, I can’t read it—”

“Add two counterclockwise stirs at the end of the Burke pattern, before you add the beetle carapaces.” Harry eyed his work for a moment, decided it was passable, and accepted the newspaper from Neville.

**ETHAN THORNE TO BE TRIED FOR ILLEGAL USE OF BLOOD MAGIC ON MINORS**

_In what is coming to be known as the Thorne Scandal, Lord James Potter finds himself in a corner for his defense of his longtime best friend._

_“Ethan would never do this,” Lord Potter insisted just two days ago. “He’s been framed or something. There’s no way he would use blood magic! And definitely not on minors!”_

_Thorne is representing himself in this case, as is his right as a legal expert, with the full backing of Houses Potter, Macmillan, and Vance. The defense collectively insisted upon Thorne’s innocence, but when the evidence was presented to a trial subcommittee of the Wizengamot convened yesterday morning, all representatives of House Potter and its allies were unavailable for comment._

_The prosecution, led by Law Master Terren Morris of Greengrass, Tate, & Morris, presented a much stronger case than it seems anyone expected. A collection of plain leather-bound notebooks were confiscated from a group of Hogwarts students including Heir Hadrian Black and an undisclosed list of others. Each notebook was inlaid with highly illegal runes that would interact magically with the user’s blood over time, and allow for the caster of the runes to track the people who had used the notebooks. The runes work rather like a Class F blood quill that causes no external harm to the user and merely imbues the object with a small amount of blood to tie the user with the contract signed or runes written. It is a benign and passive method of magical tracking that has nonetheless been banned since 1803. _

_Inside sources have implied that the defense will be arguing for a lighter sentence on the grounds that the spell used was entirely harmless to the targeted students. Whether this will be a successful approach remains unknown, as the Wizengamot trial committee and its staff have been very tight-lipped on the subject. Regardless of the harm done or not, Thorne still dabbled in illegal magic._

_When asked to provide proof that Thorne actually sent the spelled objects, the prosecution presented the letter that accompanied them. They were delivered as a gift from a distant relative of the Lovegood family. The Lovegoods are known to travel often and maintain few close relationships beyond their immediately family members, so it comes as no surprise that Heir Lovegood didn’t question the gift from a relative she had not seen in years. The relative, whose name remains confidential for security purposes, provided Veritaserum testimony that they had nothing to do with the gift._

_An Unspeakable was brought before the Wizengamot to determine the real sender. Buried under a bevy of spells deigned to mask one’s magical signature, traces were found that provide a sixty-four percent match to that of Law Master Ethan Thorne. Seventy percent is the cutoff for incontrovertible proof of guilt. However, the Unspeakable involved testified that there is almost no chance of getting a proof positive match when efforts are taken to mask one’s signature._

_Incidentally, spells to disguise magical signature on enchanted objects are also illegal, for this very reason._

_The court is expected to rule on the case and the appropriate punishment this evening._

Harry grinned down at the newspaper. Neville took a step backwards. “Simple, really,” he said, folding it and handing it back. “We wrote the notes, enchanted the journals, faked Thorne’s magical signature based off a letter I lifted off Jules a few weeks ago since I _know_ he uses this special legal-caliber sealing spell on all his envelopes, pretended to wipe the signature, and then had Luna “accidentally” leave her journal in Flitwick’s classroom. He has this sixth sense for spells and enchantments—if you look up old interviews, he says it’s what helped him be such a good duelist. It never picks up the journals with a horde of students and their wayward spells bouncing around his class but with no one else to distort the magic, he realized it was blood magic and asked her about it, and called the DMLE, and then they confiscated journals from some of the rest of us…” He trailed off suggestively.

“But—that’s—oh, fuck it,” Neville said, throwing his hands dramatically in the air.

 _“Watch_ it,” Justin said. “Delicate potion here!”

“Sorry.” Neville set the paper aside.

“Nev, we went over this when we came up with the contingency plan,” Pansy said. She glanced at Harry. “Which we’ll have to modify, by the way.”

Harry shrugged. “A self-destruct option would honestly be simpler. I realized that last week when we were planning out this Thorne mess. I’ve already worked it into the runes.”

“Of course you have,” Justin said with a grin.

Neville set his expression. “Because he deserves it.”

“Exactly,” Harry agreed, keeping his frown hidden. Sometimes… Hermione had a ruthless streak a mile wide and it was usually fairly easy to get her to go along with his less morally upright plans. Neville… deep down, Neville was _good_. In a way Harry and most of his other friends weren’t. Even Justin, whose loyalty was less… conditional.

He really needed to talk to Barty. Good thing they had a session tonight.

“Wait,” Neville said. “It’s impossible to fake someone’s magical signature. Even with a sample. Those spells to mask it are standard-issue for criminals for that reason.”

Harry and Pansy swapped a smirk. “Might be impossible for people who don’t have access to Slytherin’s library and those of several very old pureblood families,” Harry said smugly. The Black and Nott libraries had yielded some _very_ interesting results when he was tracking down a way to do this.

“Yeah, yeah, Heir of Slytherin, _très_ _importante_ ,” Neville said in a very bad imitation of a French accent. “I’m gonna go find Hannah, I think she said she was having trouble with Herbology.”

Pansy, Harry, and Justin watched him go. “I don’t think he totally approves,” Justin said.

“Stick to potions,” Pansy said in a fake-kind voice. “If we needed someone to state the obvious we’d have let Draco keep Vince around.”

Justin managed to throw a Peruvian snail shell at her head without messing up his stirring pattern. Harry eyed them both for a few seconds to make sure they weren’t about to blow up his laboratory and turned his attention back to his Polyjuice.

Harry was waiting in their classroom when Barty came in.

The Death Eater paused halfway through the door. He varied his arrival times from two to forty minutes before their sessions, according to the snakes Harry had set on him way back in November. So Harry had just shown up an hour ahead of time and worked on a Charms essay, and packed it away neatly when Kesstey showed up hissing about the wheat-headed two-legs coming.

She wasn’t the brightest of his reptilian scouts.

“Harry,” Barty said, closing the door slowly. “You’re early.”

He looked a bit wary. That wasn’t surprising. Harry had done little to disguise the fact that he had something rather… important on his mind. Then there was the fact that he’d taken Barty’s normal seat behind the desk, leaving Barty with a choice of either forcing Harry out of the seat or taking the one across from him.

If Harry had been in his place, he’d have vanished the plain students’ chair and conjured a nice armchair instead. Barty completely disregarded the entire scheme and sat in Harry’s usual chair like he hadn’t noticed anything was out of the ordinary.

Actually, he might not have. Bloody Ravenclaw.

“Something’s on your mind,” Barty said.

“You could say that.” Harry fished out a copy of the Prophet from the breakout and flipped it around, pointing to the pictures of Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange. “You may’ve forgotten but Neville Longbottom is a good friend of mine.”

“A _friend?”_ Barty said shrewdly.

“We’ve been over this. I do have those.”

Barty smirked. “Most of your type of Slytherin prefer minions.”

“Is that what you are?” Harry shot back.

“Only partially,” Barty said. “But I’m the exception. I take it by your continued magical presence that you haven’t revealed my identity to the Longbottom boy.”

Harry didn’t dignify that with an answer.

Barty shifted a bit in his seat. An obvious tell. He would’ve been bloody terrifying if he went to Slytherin, with his brain and the training of common-room politics. You could only learn so much at home from parents’ stories, as evidenced by one Draco Malfoy. As it was, Barty was still pretty damn intimidating.

That was probably a factor of spending time with Riddle and then as a Death Eater.

“You know I didn’t participate,” he said.

“Just watched.”

“Don’t you dare condemn me for something you cannot understand,” Barty spat.

Harry raised an eyebrow. Apparently he’d hit a touchy spot. “I wasn’t.”

Barty eyed him for a few seconds, absently tapping his fingers on the edge of the table. Moments like this Harry really felt his intellectual inferiority. He was smart, but that was mostly because he’d been working his ass off since first year. Barty was something else entirely and you could feel it sometimes. He would get the look of a chess grandmaster playing games on a board you couldn’t even see.

“You know the Longbottoms killed Rabastan.”

“Yes.” Hm. Bellatrix and Sirius were about the same age, although she was one part of Sirius’ past that he refused to talk about no matter how much Harry prodded. Which meant Rodolphus and Rabastan were probably in school around the same time. Regulus, Sirius, Bellatrix, the Lestranges—oh, hell, Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy too—that must’ve been a _hell_ of a time to be in school.

The point being, Rabastan and Barty probably knew each other.

Oh. Duh. Harry wanted to smack himself in the forehead.

“Rabastan and I were…” Barty took a breath. “We were engaged.”

Harry blinked. “I, ah. Didn’t realize wizards accepted…”

“You’re such a Mudblood sometimes,” Barty complained.

“Excuse you?”

“Culturally inept.” Barty frowned. “I suppose it’s not your fault, more the Ministry’s…”

“Care to explain?” Harry wasn’t sure how this had become a history lesson but he _hated_ being called culturally inept like—Merlin, like one of the insufferable Creevey brothers, haring about with a camera like a bloody tourist.

No thank you.

“Sometimes I forget you essentially grew up a Mud-ggle-born,” Barty said. “Muggles have some rather backwards ideas about sexuality. Wizards, on the other hand, have not cared.” He grimaced. “It _was_ a problem, before the witch hunts got particularly bad in the ninth and tenth centuries A.D., but there simply weren’t enough of us to ostracize same-sex couples. We needed them to blood adopt orphaned children and continue their families’ lines.”

“What changed?” Harry knew Sirius had had romantic and sexual flings with guys as well as girls in the past, and he’d mentioned something in their last mirror conversation about a German wizard he met in the Leaky Cauldron and swapped Floo addresses with, but— “I’ve never heard of a same-sex magical couple. I kind of just… thought you lot treated it like the Muggles.”

Barty made a face. “How degrading. No, it’s—approximately three percent of our population ends up in a same-sex relationship. Or used to. The problem is the blood adoption restrictions. Those date back to around the seventeen fifties. Line inheritance is paramount to purebloods and blood adoption is necessary to get the family magics to accept an Heir. It used to be a same-sex couple would simply blood adopt Muggle-borns or orphans from magical families. When the Ministry banned that…” He shrugged. “Nowadays, for gay wizards and witches, they’ll enter into a marriage with the understanding that they’ll produce an heir and a spare and from then on turn a blind eye to one another’s sexual infidelities. If you go to enough pureblood weddings you’ll notice when they kind of quietly drop the line about staying true to your spouse. The Ministry never notices and the rest of us pretend not to.”

Harry sat in silence for a few seconds. “So… you and Rabastan…”

“I had the _biggest_ crush on Sirius for a few years there,” Barty said. “Didn’t help I knew he was into guys. But Regulus might actually have murdered one of us if that went anywhere. Rab… we were together from sixth year on.” Pain was evident in his voice, but the old, quiet kind that you simply had to live with. Nothing jarring, and nothing that could easily be exploited. “Only our close friends knew.” Harry took that to mean _the other aspiring Death Eaters._ “I’d planned to father a child with a witch who knew the plan, support her financially and emotionally through the pregnancy, name the child my Heir, and be done with it. Rab had a marriage contract with a Hufflepuff in our year, Mackenzie Smith. She preferred women, and when she and her girlfriend walked in on Rab and me in a broom closet, she proposed to Rab on the spot.”

Harry grinned. “She sounds like quite something.”

“Oh, she was,” Barty said. “No one who met her would ever claim Puffs were pushovers.”

“Why are you telling me all this?”

“You asked,” Barty said. “The story is relevant to my explanation. Emotions are, in essence, neurochemical con jobs, and once properly managed, they can’t be used to manipulate people. Also, look, I’m not _proud_ of the Longbottom mess—no, actually, that’s a lie. I am. I didn’t think they’d end up permanently insane, though.”

It was weirdly refreshing to be around someone who didn’t mince words. Slytherin word games were fun but only up to a point.

And that bit about their insanity. “Sirius said something similar. About—how many times did they go under Crucio?”

“Three each. The Selwyns,” Barty said.

Harry nodded. “Do you have any idea why they’re permanent members of St. Mungo’s mental ward?”

“Oh, loads,” Barty said dismissively. “Ranging from approximately one in four to one in a few million odds of being the true explanation. Which is all complicated by the possibility of _combinations_ of those various explanations.”

“What’s the most likely, then?” Harry said patiently.

Barty grimaced. “Bellatrix’s self-control is, ah, questionable. She loved Rab. More than Rodolphus, I sometimes thought. Their marriage was a political one between two friends, but Rodolphus was always busy with his duties as Heir and that Bellatrix’s family wasn’t the main Black line. She had more time. Rab was like her brother. She learned Legilimency from the best. The Dark Lord’s orders were to not cause permanent harm. If she misjudged the effects of Legilimency attacks plus the Crucio…”

“Can’t you ask her?” Harry said.

“I suppose.” Barty cocked his head. “I’ve been busy with other things. It hadn’t crossed my mind, to be honest.”

Harry resisted the urge to rub his temples. It was almost as bad as dealing with Luna. “It’s quite an interesting unsolved question,” he prompted.

“Yes, it is indeed… Hm. I’ll have to see…” Barty’s distant gaze suddenly snapped back into focus and he let out a raspy laugh. “Oh, very good.”

“Thanks,” Harry said, grinning and unrepentant. Barty had been _teaching_ him manipulation techniques, for Circe’s sake.

“Just for a good attempt at applying our lessons, I’ll even tell you what she says.” Barty smirked. “Probably. You _did_ attempt it on me. Has that answered all your questions?”

Not quite. Harry really wanted to know if and when the Dark Lord was planning on going after that blood magic ban, which he was becoming more convinced by the day was a stupid reactionary tactic against powerful magic. However, he doubted Barty would answer that question, and it also might tip too much of Harry’s own hand, so he nodded and allowed the lesson to be redirected into dueling.

Barty was apparently nursing a bit of a grudge about Harry bringing up sensitive subjects. He had never used curses quite that brutal before. Harry dodged everything except a Bone-Breaker and a _vicious_ Apathy Jinx that took almost two hours to wear off.

He came out of it sitting up against the wall. Harry snarled at Barty as he shook the last of the cobwebs out of his head. Apathy Jinxes were nasty business; they basically turned you into a puppet with its strings cut for as long as they lasted. And that had been a _really_ strong one. It broke right through his Occlumency shields like paper.

“A lesson in caution,” Barty said. 

“Right,” Harry said. Caution his arse; that was payback. “Homework?”

“None this week.”

Judging by the interested gleam in his eye, he was having fun analyzing Harry’s negative reaction to any kind of mental control. Harry promptly set himself the unofficial homework of working even harder than usual on his Occlumency barriers. They were defenses built up over time that got stronger the more time you spent on them, and he had a good feeling he’d be dodging more Apathy Jinxes next week.

“Still just once a week?” he checked.

“I _do_ have other duties.”

“Right,” Harry said. He hesitated. Barty hadn’t had to be—honest. Then again it could all have been a lie but Harry could corroborate pretty easily through Draco or Sirius. “Thanks.”

Barty jerked his head in some kind of imitation nod. Harry took that as his cue to escape.

Fuck, he wished he could talk about this with Sirius.

But he was afraid his godfather wouldn’t understand.

_Ethan_

This was ridiculous. This was _not possible._

But it was happening.

Ethan’s thoughts kept circling back around to that one point, like a boomerang to its owner. Every other minute found him half-convinced the whole disaster was a cruel dream or a convoluted Death Eater ploy but it _wasn’t_. It was real and happening and awful.

James had come to see him, twice with Remus and four times alone. They were supportive and helpful and Ethan could barely stand to see either of their fucking faces.

“It’ll be fine,” James said stubbornly, “Albus will sort this out, you’ll be _fine_.” But he was wrong and Ethan knew it.

Remus knew it, too, which was a whole other kind of unbearable. He just stood there while James went off on one of his idealistic rambles of which Ethan was usually so fond, and Remus’ expression was an awful mix of resignation and sympathy. Not pity, which was good, because Ethan might actually have decked him. He supposed it came from Remus’ experience with dementors. The werewolf knew what Ethan would be facing and, unlike James, he knew there was no chance of it _not happening._

There were other visitors, too, Order members all, and Albus himself a few times. Ethan was grudgingly grateful for Albus’ few appearances because the man was legitimately and exceedingly busy. Their pity—not from Albus, though that was no surprise—grated on his nerves, and their idealism was as bad as James’.

But the real reason his fists clenched when he saw any of them was that they just would not listen.

“It was Black,” he insisted, “it was Black that did this, _he_ framed me, not the Death Eaters.”

“He wouldn’t,” they all said. “He couldn’t. He’s fifteen, and uneducated, and a _child_ was the first in our entire history to figure out how to fake a magical signature?”

“He’s brilliant,” Ethan said. “He’s Lily Potter’s son, and _she_ was brilliant, and he’s got access to multiple ancient Dark libraries, and Merlin only knows what else down in the dungeons, I wouldn’t put it past him! And how would the Death Eaters have even learned about the journals?”

“Crouch, masquerading as Mad-eye,” they’d say promptly. “Those teens weren’t subtle about the journals—Ron and Ernest and Susan, they all saw Black’s friend group carrying those journals around.”

When Ethan tried to convince Albus, he at least considered it. Ethan had to give him credit. But he _still_ decided Ethan was wrong.

“I understand,” he said quietly, sitting across from Ethan in the Ministry containment cell. Its Department of Mysteries runes dampened his magic, and he was pretty helpless without a wand anyway. Not being able to cast spells made him itchy and restless. “You are angry, and frustrated, and looking for someone to blame.”

“No,” Ethan said. “Albus. _Albus._ If I just wanted someone to blame _I would have Voldemort._ That’s not the issue here! It’s Black that did this! You have allowed him too much leeway and he’s using it against us!”

It was too much of a coincidence. The journals, the blood magic, the Parseltongue, Death Eater libraries. Everything. Hadrian Black hated Ethan and Ethan didn’t have the protection of being a former blood relation like James. He didn’t have the protection of being a valuable member of magical society, not for nobility, not for power, not for intellect or position.

He never had.

“He is a child,” Albus said firmly. “He would no more have been capable of doing this than Jules. Ethan, _I_ have not been able to reverse-engineer the process of a falsified magical signature. Harry Black could not have done so! No matter how gifted, no matter he is Lily’s son!”

Ethan gritted his teeth and held Albus’ gaze for a long moment.

He wasn’t going to change his mind.

“Fine,” Ethan said, slumping back on the bed. He hadn’t felt this—this _helpless_ since the Healers told him about Mum’s illness. “Just—fine. You’re going to regret this faith in him, Albus.”

“I genuinely do not believe so,” Albus said gently. He stood, and rested a hand on Ethan’s shoulder. “But I understand your concern about him and I will endeavor to watch the boy.”

It wasn’t enough, but it was something. “Thank you,” Ethan said, bitterly, sincerely.

“Anything.” Albus rubbed his eyes under his spectacles. “Ethan—I cannot save you from your sentence. I’ve made certain you will be placed in a high-level cell with minimal dementor presence, and that you will have rather more comfort available than the average inmate, but you must serve a full year. The announcement won’t be made to the public for a bit but I’ve managed to find out your sentence, as a courtesy.”

Sick dread coalesced in Ethan’s stomach. His contracted and he tasted bile, swallowed it back down. Apparently he’d been clinging to a last thread of hope that Albus could stop this, and now—

“I understand,” he said. “I’ll get through it.”

Others had done so. Ethan could, too.

“I know you will. You’re strong,” Albus said. “And your mother—James and Remus offered to continue visiting her, I understand?”

“Yeah.” Ethan closed his eyes and let himself be grateful for them now, since gratitude would be sucked out as dementor food soon enough. “They’re—pretty great.”

“She will be well looked after,” Albus promised.

That, at least, Ethan knew he would do. “I know. Thank you.”

Albus hesitated. “Ethan… I am sorry.”

Ethan looked up at him. “It’s not your fault.”

“I’m still sorry,” Albus said quietly. Ethan was glad he left immediately after that because then Ethan didn’t have to hide how bad his last words tasted. He hated having to lie. Especially to Albus.

Andromeda visited not two hours later.

The DMLE guards took her wand and searched her with eight different runic arrays and enchanted devices to make absolutely sure she wasn’t smuggling so much as a potato chip into the cell block. Ethan could hear her irritated tones from all the way down the empty hall. Albus had gotten him one of the nicer containment cells, which meant the other four in this area were empty, since petty criminals and thieves got the dingy cells two levels down.

Ethan was standing at the front of his cell by the time Andromeda got close enough for her voice to form distinguishable words. “—thank you to keep your hands out of my purse.”

“Andromeda,” he said.

“Ethan.” She glared impatiently over her shoulder until one of the guards finally unlocked the cell. For a second, while she had the door open, the itch of no magic lessened, but then Andromeda closed it behind her and the tiny reprieve disappeared.

“Thanks for coming.”

Andromeda lowered herself into the same chair Albus had occupied earlier that day. “Of course. How are you? They treating you all right?”

“For an inmate,” Ethan said, bitterly.

“Mm.” Andromeda glanced around. The cell was fairly spacious, equipped with a bed, chair, end table, and privacy screen to shield the toilet, but none of that disguised the fact that it was still a bare stone box carved with runes to keep him magically helpless. “When do they take you to the prison?”

Ethan closed his eyes. Inhale, exhale. “Tomorrow.”

“Not beating around the bush, then,” she said. “Unsurprising. Such a prominent figure, using blood magic against children… no wonder they’re eager to prove themselves a proactive justice system.”

Her tone could’ve withered an entire forest. Ethan grimaced. “It’s as neat a frame job as I’ve ever seen,” he admitted grudgingly.

“A clever ploy,” Andromeda agreed. “Worthy of a Slytherin. Particularly a Slytherin who had help.”

Ethan’s eyes snapped up to hers in a painfully obvious tell he couldn’t quite prevent. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying I’ve spoken with other Order members,” Andromeda murmured, eyes ticking over to the cell door to make sure no guards were close enough to hear. “I’m saying I know you’re convinced it was Black behind this, not the Death Eaters.”

“Come to talk me out of it?” Ethan sneered.

Andromeda leaned back and crossed one long leg over the other. “The opposite. I’m here so you have a chance to convince me that you’re right.”

“It’s too big a coincidence,” Ethan said immediately. This was not an opportunity he could afford to miss. “The Death Eaters have nothing to gain from taking me down right now. It doesn’t do much to James—he could just cut me off and say he had nothing to do with it if he believed this whole bullshit. Even though he hasn’t people aren’t that angry. The blood magic wasn’t actively harmful and enough people have pointed out that I was trying to protect the children by tracking them to derail the worst attacks.” He smiled bitterly. “We both know I’m only a threat to the Death Eaters because I’m attached to the Potters. They have bigger problems than me. Hadrian Black, though—he hates me, he has _cause_ to hate me, he has at minimum four old Dark pureblood libraries at his disposal, a whole network of little friends to help him, and he’s apparently brilliant. And a _Slytherin_. As you pointed out—this plan has Slytherin written all over it.”

The whole time he was talking, Andromeda’s eyes remained fixed on his. She sat perfectly still with an unreadable expression even after he finished. Ethan fought the urge to squirm in his seat like a fourth-year in McGonagall’s office.

“Lily Evans certainly was brilliant,” she allowed. “You make a good point about the libraries. And the hatred.”

“You don’t have to believe that I’m right,” Ethan said. “Just that I might be. That’s enough. Albus considered it, and dismissed it.”

Andromeda’s lips curled. “Albus is an idealist. It makes him an excellent leader but a poor tactician on occasions such as these. He wants so badly to save the boy he damned fourteen years ago that he’ll rationalize his way out of seeing Black as a threat. I think it’s more likely you’re right than he is, in this instance, but, Ethan, there’s very little I can do.”

 _Believing me is enough_ , Ethan wanted to say, but the gut-wrenching relief that someone believed him had no place here. Sentiment meant almost nothing to Andromeda if it didn’t come from one of the few people she genuinely cared about and Ethan knew full well he wasn’t one of them. They just had similar goals. “Watch him. Keep a handle on how much the Order gives him. Try to convince some of the others to at least be suspicious instead of just following Albus’ lead. And—” He hesitated. “Try to keep Jules from getting too close to him.”

“I have very little influence with Julian, but the rest is manageable.” Andromeda offered him a ghost of a smile. “Frankly, it’s what I intended to do anyway.”

And that’s why Ethan was trusting her. “Remus has influence with Jules, and you with Remus.”

Andromeda raised her eyebrows in a silent question.

“A Slytherin and a Black, who married a Muggle-born and forged a good life _using_ the things other people judge you for, not despite of them,” Ethan clarified. He’d picked up on some things in the last few months of getting to know Remus better, of late nights in James’ study with the three of them talking and sometimes passing around bottles. “Obviously very different circumstances but he looks up to you more than he’ll admit. And he sees something of Sirius in you.”

“Of course he does,” Andromeda muttered. “Well. I’ll see if I can… speak to him… we weren’t friends in school, exactly, but I found him more tolerable than James, to be blunt. And I’m sure both he and James could use the support right now.”

Ethan knew she meant she could use the emotional gap created by his imprisonment to ingratiate herself with James and Remus. He also didn’t care. It would provide James and Remus legitimate emotional support, and help keep Jules from getting too close to Harry Black, and it would mean he’d have allies waiting for him when he came back from Azkaban. “Thank you.”

“Mm.” Andromeda uncrossed her legs and stood. With their negotiations complete, she’d no more reason to stay. Neither of them needed to bother pretended she’d come here for Ethan’s sake. It was sort of refreshing, that lack of pretense. “Don’t underestimate the dementors, Ethan. Force of will doesn’t mean much. Neither will clinging to plans for the future. And I know you know those things, rationally, but I’m also sure part of you is stubbornly convinced you can tough it out. Gryffindor.” Her lips quirked without humor. “Try to kill that conviction, if you can. It will only make it harder. You can’t resist them—all you’ll be able to do is endure.”

Ethan watched her go without really seeing anything. She had a point, he knew. There was no way to just _tough out_ the dementors. And once Andromeda said it, he realized she was right—about a little part of him believing he could just withstand them through sheer force of will.

But she was wrong, too. Ethan remembered what Black had said about surviving twelve years in there with his sanity remarkably undestroyed. It had taken mind healers and time to start putting the man back together but he wasn’t entirely gone and he’d said it was the thought of his false imprisonment that kept him together in there. Being unpleasant, the dementors hadn’t been able to take it.

Well, Ethan hadn’t been betrayed by his mentor and best friend, but he also wasn’t going to be stuck in there forever. He was wrongfully imprisoned. Harry Black had done this. Even once he forced himself to accept the truth of Andromeda’s last words, he _knew_ he could at least hang on to that.

_Harry_

“You—absolute—fucking— _bastard.”_

The familiar voice brought Harry and Pansy up short.

They exchanged a glance. Harry cast a nonverbal silencing charm followed by a Notice-Me-Not and they jogged off in the direction it had come from.

Both of them stopped dead when they rounded the next corner.

Thank Merlin this section of the sixth floor was almost never used, because Theo had apparently been at this for a few minutes and there was blood absolutely everywhere. Including on Harry’s best friend’s face.

Theo, injured. Something cold and angry snapped to life in Harry’s stomach.

He took in the rest of the scene.

Graham Pritchard, curled in a ball on the ground, surrounded by blood and the fragments of torn robes.

Three older students, all Gryffindors—no, actually, that was a Hufflepuff, except his tie had been soaked red from a gash above his collarbone.

Theo hadn’t noticed Harry and Pansy. He lifted his wand, but he was facing them, and Harry saw the syllables forming on his lips and knew what spell he was about to cast—

 _“Stupefy!”_ Pansy shouted.

Theo slumped, surprise lingering on his unconscious features.

Harry slashed his temporary charms down and stalked forward.

“Thank—you—thank—you,” one of the Gryffindors choked out, squinting at Harry through swollen eyes. He cocked his head and examined the boy clinically. That looked like seventh year Victor Delvin to him, underneath what was clearly the result of several precisely aimed Bludgeoning Hexes to the face.

“I wouldn’t thank us just yet,” Pansy said, stepping on Victor’s stomach and grinding down her heel.

His mouth gaped open. Harry got off a silencing charm and then a Stunner for good measure.

Actually, on second thought…

He stunned the other two with quick wand flicks and joined Pansy at Graham’s side.

“Hey,” Pansy said, laying a hand on Graham’s shoulder. “You conscious? Graham?”

The younger boy let out a moan.

Harry ground the heel of one hand into his eyes. He had blood on his shoes and a situation to deal with and—he didn’t want this now. The day had included a Defense lesson of Umbridge needling everyone while he and Daphne took turns silencing Hermione from under their desk and then comforting a shaken Dylan Worple after a “tea” with the ghastly High Inquisitor. And now _this_.

“Oi,” Pansy said.

“Right. Sorry.” Harry fished out his journal and stared at it for a few seconds. Gold page. This was close Vipers only.

_HB_

_Anyone in the Chamber?_

Thank Merlin he got a prompt response.

_JF_

_Yours truly_

Harry switched to Justin’s silver page.

_HB_

_5 vials unkeyed blood healing potions, 3 of dittany, 1 each Verit. and the antidote, 5 of Blood-Replacer. No one outside the inner group, and not Neville. Hurry._

_JF_

_On my way_

“Justin’s coming,” Harry said. “Nice stunner, by the way.”

“Thanks.” Pansy set about cleaning the blood off the walls and floor.

Harry eyed Theo for a few seconds before pointing his wand. _“Renervate.”_

Theo blinked and looked up at him. “Oh, hey, mate. Fancy seeing you here.” The casual words were at direct odds with the vicious snarl and bloody streaks twisting his face.

“What happened?”

“ _They_ happened.” Theo pushed himself up and leveled such a glare at the older kids Harry thought he might have to stun him again. Luckily Theo restrained himself and continued his explanation. “I was looking for a quiet place to practice… something… what with everyone else down in the Chamber lately. Heard someone yelling. I thought it might be worth investigating, slipped around the corner, and they had Graham on the ground.” Theo’s glare darkened. “Unimaginative bastards were just taking him apart with Slicing Hexes.”

“Unimaginative, but effective,” Harry pointed out.

Theo snorted. “So of course I stepped in.”

“Are you and he even friendly?” Harry said.

“He’s a Viper.” Theo’s tone of voice said he thought this should be obvious. “He’s one of y—of us.”

Harry nodded; that _did_ explain it. “What did you do to them?”

Theo’s grin was, frankly, unsettling. “They were stupid, _and_ unimaginative.”

Harry nodded again. “Do we need anything other than general healing and Blood-Replacer potions?”

“You’re _healing_ them?”

“We can’t _kill_ them,” Harry said.

“Why the hell not?”

Pansy got rid of the last big blood splatter and turned on them with a scowl. “If it was just one, maybe, but three students vanishing at once? Including Tobias Pritchard, right after Harry de facto kidnapped his brother, which everyone in the right Ministry and other circles knows by now?”

Theo deflated. “I take your point. Anyone else know Obliviate?”

“I suck at it,” Harry admitted. Occlumency he was damn good at but Mind Arts that involved going into someone _else’s_ head were _so_ not his alley. Barty still wouldn’t stop ribbing him about the failed dog Obliviation and that had happened almost right when they got back from break.

“Fucking fine,” Theo sighed.

Harry checked his watch. “Justin should be here in a minute or two. Is Graham stable?”

“Seemed like it,” Pansy said. Her face was dark. “They were cauterizing the wounds as they went.”

“No, that was me. What?” Theo demanded in response to their expressions. “I had about ten seconds to stop him bleeding out while those three recovered from getting blasted down the hall.”

“Some of those will probably scar.” Pansy poked at a long gash down Graham’s chest and stomach with a faint expression of revulsion. Maternal she wasn’t.

Harry conjured a cloth and bucket, filled the bucket with a jet of water, and shoved the lot at Theo. “Clean yourself up, you look like some kind of demon.”

“Nah,” Theo said. “If we have to wipe their heads then I’m at least going to scare them first.”

“Oh good,” Pansy said with a smile.

Harry rocked back on his heels and cast a few diagnostic charms at the group of attackers. They weren’t going to die before Justin got here. Good thing, too, because healing spells were complicated. Harry made sure every one of the Vipers got proficient at diagnostics and superficial healing of shallow cuts and bruises, that they could immobilize the area around a broken bone, and for the older set, put a person into a stasis not unlike Draught of Living Death that would slow progression of physical or curse damage almost to a halt. The problem with _that_ was that it was a constant drain on the caster’s power to hold them under, so it was pretty much just a stopgap measure until a real Healer could be found.

Healing was much easier with potions than with a wand.

Justin showed up, panting from his run, a little less than five minutes later. Eriss and Draco of all people were right behind him. Eriss went straight for Harry without hesitation but Justin and Draco stopped in their tracks.

“What the _fuck_ ,” Draco said.

Harry snapped his fingers. “Healing potions. Now.”

“Right. Sorry.” Justin fumbled a magically expanded pouch out of his pocket and tossed it over, eyes still fixed on the bodies on the floor.

Good thing Pansy had cleaned up most of the blood.

Harry cast a Cushioning Charm and upended the pouch. Vials and flagons clinked out onto the floor, caught an inch or two above it by the charm. He fished out a full flagon of his special Blood-Replacer and a vial of a healing potion waiting to be keyed to someone’s blood.

“Get that in him,” he said, passing the former off to Justin.

Justin nodded and scrambled over to Graham. Surprisingly, he’d recovered a lot faster than Draco and just gotten down to business, not minding the blood that streaked his knees and hands from the area around Graham, who was still slowly leaking red. Draco was even paler than usual and propping himself up on the wall.

While Justin worked on the Blood-Replacer, Harry carefully uncorked the vial of generalized healing potion and aimed his wand at Graham’s blood. Uncontaminated was best for this, so he funneled a thin stream of it straight out of the largest gash on his chest. The boy’s back was a mess of cuts, bruises, dust, and stone chips; nothing taken from there would be pure.

Pure. Ha.

Harry corked the vial again and shook it, feeling and seeing the potion’s latent magic kick into gear. Matteo’s lecture about blood magic over the summer helped explain why blood-keyed healing potions were so much more effective. The blood itself shaped the potion’s magic to best affect the person in question.

Justin leaned back, exhaling. “It’s all down. He’s swallowing.”

“Good.” Harry took his place and carefully poured the healing potion down Graham’s throat, hitting him with a healer’s charm to make him swallow. Graham’s throat convulsed. A bit of potion dripped out of the corner of his mouth but almost all of it went down. Harry flicked his wand and spelled away the spill.

“We wait?” Pansy checked.

“Shouldn’t be more than a minute or two. Draco, pull yourself together, it’s just a bit of blood and no one’s going to die.”

“Shut it, Black,” Draco snarled. Anger and wounded pride stiffened his spine at the direct order. He pushed off the wall and stalked over to stand next to Pansy.

She smirked at him. Draco seemed to realize he’d been played and deflated a bit but he didn’t slouch back into the shell-shocked posture from before. A definite improvement. None of the Vipers, least of all Harry, was stupid enough to think their little extracurricular club would make it through this whole mess without seeing some fighting. Better that Draco get the squeamishness out of his system now when it wouldn’t cost him or another Viper their life.

“He’s healing.” Justin pointed, rather unnecessarily, at Graham’s chest. The muscle and fat tissue visible inside the clean gash were slowly knitting together. It was a slightly paler shade that indicated hyperactive scar tissue, a survival trait evolved by magical and nonmagical humans alike. Harry knew the results wouldn’t be pretty but they were remarkably effective.

“Won’t the gravel in his back… oh.” Draco squinted at the mess of cuts in Graham’s back. As he healed from the inside out, debris was pushed out of the body. Contaminated blood mixed with stone dust and chips from where curses had gouged up the floor dripped off his body, a trick Barty had taught him. Harry would eat his wand if Graham hadn’t been writhing in pain and grinding his shredded back into the equally shredded stone.

The cold, angry feeling was getting stronger. He reminded himself to breathe, and reminded himself of all the reasons Pansy had given Theo for why these people couldn’t die.

Today, at least.

Color returned to Graham’s skin. He shifted and the tattered remnants of his robes fell away. Harry’s eyes narrowed; he’d _bought_ those robes for Graham to replace all the clothes the boy hadn’t had time to gather from home. In fact, they’d had to replace nearly all Graham’s things, including his books and trunk. It was fortunate the kid had done like all the Vipers and kept his wand on him at all times because Harry was not at all sure the family would’ve returned even that much. And it was _criminal_ to deprive a witch or wizard from their wand.

“Graham,” Justin said gently. “Hey, buddy, can you hear me?”

 _Buddy?_ Draco mouthed. Pansy elbowed him hard enough for the blond to make a choking noise and clutch at his ribs.

Graham blinked open his eyes. “Wha… Justin. Harry. Hey… where’m I?”

“What do you remember?” Harry said, deliberately shifting so Graham’s view of the older students was blocked.

“Er… I was… there’s some unused classrooms up here,” Graham said, frowning. “An’… V’ronica and Malco’m were gonna meet me… work on Charms homework. I came early. And then…”

His eyes blew wide suddenly and he struggled to sit up. “They—they—out of nowhere—”

“Calm down. You’re safe.” Harry injected as much command into his voice as he could without veering into threat territory. Graham quit struggling to sit up and flopped back, breathing hard. Delayed panic still had the kid’s heart pounding hard enough they could all see it in his throat.

“Theo came along and helped you,” Justin said. “Then Harry and Pansy, and they called Draco and me.”

“Oh,” Graham said, squinting suspiciously up at all of them. Harry grinned; he was living up to his green-and-silver tie. Even when injured.

“Vipers,” Justin said, rolling his eyes. “And I, at least, don’t have an ulterior motive.”

 _Neither did the rest of us_ , Harry thought. _For once._

“Who was it?” Pansy said.

Graham shifted. The bodies were down by his feet. Harry pressed Graham’s shoulder to keep him down. It’d be better for some of the panic to subside before they let him see what Theo had done. “Eh… that Hufflepuff. Something Carmichael.” _Eddie_ , Harry’s brain supplied, one of the seventh-year prefects. “And Victor Delvin. And…” A cross between a sob and a snarl tore its way out of Graham’s lungs. “My _brother_.”

Well, shit. Harry had hated Toby Pritchard for years. He hadn’t even _recognized_ him among the bodies.

 _Not bodies_ , he corrected himself. They were alive.

“Are they alive?”

He blinked. Graham was looking between Harry and Justin with a cold expression that didn’t quite hide something else lurking underneath. Pain. Grief. Something a lot more raw. Like when they faced off with his father, Harry was impressed by Graham’s mask.

“Shockingly, yes,” Theo said darkly from behind Graham. The kid didn’t try to turn. “It’s only thanks to Pansy’s timely intervention.”

For the life of him, Harry couldn’t figure out if disappointment or relief flickered across Graham’s face.

“Okay.” Graham swallowed. “I’m gonna sit up now.”

Harry shrugged. If Graham thought he could handle it—again, the Vipers weren’t stupid. He had to know Theo wouldn’t react well.

Graham pushed himself upright on slightly trembling arms. Looked around Harry and Justin. Blinked. “Theo, what the fuck did you _do_?”

“Harry, you have _got_ to keep Black from teaching him that kind of language,” Draco said, appalled. “It’s not proper manners for a—a thirteen-year-old!”

For a few seconds, this so flabbergasted all of them that they forgot the unconscious bleeding people on the floor and stared at Draco.

He glared back even as he turned a slow, dull red.

Pansy broke first. “Oh—my—fucking—Merlin,” she choked out, cackling. “I actually cannot deal with you sometimes.”

“What?” Draco demanded. “Manners are _important.”_

“Right,” Graham said blankly. He stared at Draco like he was trying to piece together a puzzle. “Like I’ve never heard worse words while my dad used me as a tablet for wand burns.”

Draco blinked. “He _what?”_

“Did no one explain to him?” Theo said to the group at large. His evil smile was aimed at Draco now and had a lot less active malice in it.

“I mean. I knew they had some kind of fight,” Draco said, staring at Graham with not a little horror. Harry resisted the urge to rub his temples. He’d allowed the story to get back to Draco because Theo said the Death Eaters wouldn’t use it against Pritchard at the moment. This still wasn’t how he’d have preferred Draco learn the details. “And he showed up at the Black house all freaked out. They— _wand burns?”_

Graham wordlessly shoved up his sleeve. Most of the burns had left faint silvery circles on his skin, healing potions be damned. Draco’s horror visibly progressed to the nausea stage. His mouth gaped open but no words came out.

Harry gave in and pressed a finger to his left temple. “Draco, did you even pay attention to James Potter’s trial? Like, at all? Or have you ever seen me shower?” His skin was a little darker than average white, and that only made the countless little nicks on his arms, knuckles, back, and calves stand out more. It was hard to miss.

“Well. Those were _Muggles_.”

“James and Dumbledore knew,” Harry said wearily. “Or at least Dumbledore. He had his little Squib follower spying on me my whole life.”

Pansy snorted. “Draco, honestly, it’s not like Muggles have a monopoly on awful parenting.”

“Still. A magical child. Hell, _any_ child. _Muggle_ children shouldn’t—children are…” Draco waved his hands a bit hysterically.

“Oi,” Justin said loudly. “I know it’s dramatic but can we maybe have a meltdown about the existence of shitty parents later? Like, maybe when there’s not people bleeding on the floor? Unless you’ve decided to let them die.”

“Nope,” Pansy said. “Like I said. They can’t just poof all at once. Be handy if that basilisk was still alive, actually, it could eat them.”

“Right,” Harry said, climbing to his feet and hauling a still-unsteady Graham up after him. Healing potions were good but not _that_ good. Graham would probably need another one tonight and two more the next day to heal him fully. “Healing potions.” 

Draco handled Devlin, Pansy took Pritchard, and Justin dealt with Carmichael. Harry would’ve jumped in to help key the healing potions but Graham didn’t seem inclined to get more than a foot away from him and he didn’t want to make the kid get close to his attackers. He also didn’t want Theo too close to them, but for an entirely different reason.

Theo looked at them like Eriss did one of Harry’s Imperiused rodents, seconds before he ended the spell and she ate it.

Judging by the smugness pulsing down the familiar bond, magnified by Eriss being right there on his shoulders, his snake had sensed that comparison in his mind and was very proud of it.

 _“If you were human, you would have the evilest smirk ever on your face right now,”_ Harry murmured.

_“Yes, well. I am magnificence. He is an appropriate friend if he reminds you of a viper.”_

_“We’re all vipers.”_

_“Some more than others.”_ This was accompanied by a person-sense that Harry vaguely associated with—stutters and slow courage and earth and steadiness. Neville. Of course.

_“True.”_ Neville was—not a viper. A bear, maybe.

Eriss poked Harry’s ear. _“Worry about him another time.”_

Harry blinked and tuned back into the world. The healing potions were ready, held in his friends’ hands.

“Here goes,” he sighed. _“Renervate.”_

They woke up groaning and unhappy. Of course, they only froze when they saw Harry crouching in front of them, deliberately making his posture unthreatening because he knew the contrast of that with their fear would drive them nuts. He’d also lifted the invisibility off of Eriss, seeing as they were going to forget this anyway. Theo, Pansy, Draco, and Justin were behind him somewhere, and looking appropriately threatening if Harry knew them at all. Graham had come to stand next to him like a very small watchdog.

“B-Black,” Carmichael rasped. His brackish eyes were huge and flick-flick-flicking between Harry and the other Vipers. Harry didn’t bother to hide his disgusted sneer.

Devlin coughed up blood. “What… are you…”

“Oh, just asking a few questions,” Harry said with his most charismatic smile. The one that had charmed Babbling into giving him a Restricted Section pass, and gotten most of his teachers to get over their reflexive horror that a _Potter_ had gone to _Slytherin_.

All three attackers recoiled slightly. Eriss’ delight pulsed at him through the familiar bond, mingling with his own until he might have forgotten where he ended and she began if he hadn’t kept such firm order of his own mind.

“Graham. Please.”

“Look at that.” Pansy’s voice was just a little sharper than usual. Just a little meaner. “It speaks.”

“It?” Justin asked.

Harry could practically feel Pansy’s sickly sweet smile. “Well, I’d hardly classify it as a _wizard_ , would you? Not nearly… _worth_ that.”

“I _am_ a wizard, bitch,” Pritchard managed to snap despite the clear pain wracking his body. Harry eyed the slashed tendons that kept his legs more or less useless. Theo had been precise indeed.

“Not a good one, clearly.” Draco’s drawl was as derisive and oily as Harry had ever heard. “Can barely use a wand if a _fifth year_ could take him down… even with two of his friends backing him up.”

“Pretty ignoble,” Justin agreed apathetically. “I thought lions were the _brave_ ones.”

“He’s got it coming.” Pritchard managed to flop onto his back, propped up on both elbows. “C’mon… Malfoy… Parkinson… _you_ know what it’s like. Having… family…” _coughing_ , “expectations. Graham… betrayed ours. Even if we’re… not your side… can’t you get that?”

“See, the difference is that _my_ father would never leave me to stumble out of a fellow House mate’s Floo covered in wand burns,” Draco hissed. “No matter _what_ I did to let the family down. _He_ understands that magical children are precious.”

Pritchard twitched.

“Cottoned on yet?” Theo said snidely. All three of them flinched again. “No help from us.”

“Why’d you do it?” Harry said, still conversational. “Carmichael, Devlin… why are you even involved in this?”

“Fuck you,” Devlin spat, clearly having decided that pleas for mercy were useless.

Harry grinned at him. Right here… his friends were behind him. He could drop the mask for once. Let loose the part of him that was twisted, broken, _wrong_. 

Judging by their sudden pallor, it wasn’t pleasant.

He wasn’t _feeling_ particularly pleasant. Harry twirled his wand around his fingers. He was pretty sure he could Crucio them right here without a hitch, no matter he’d never done it to a person other than a few seconds to Barty—he was that pissed. It didn’t really matter. The school wards would definitely pick up an Unforgivable up here without the interference of the dungeons and the Slytherin magic, and if not those, then Dumbeldore’s monitors.

Instead, he leaned forward and whacked Devlin’s foot with his left hand. The foot attached to the shin presently exhibiting a textbook compound fracture.

Devlin screamed.

“Someone remembered silencers, right?” Justin said over the noise.

“Yep,” Harry said cheerfully. “Theo, portraits?”

“Checked before I started in on them, obviously. They put up some wards before.”

As expected. Theo wasn’t so careless.

Devlin’s scream died off. “Get the picture?” Harry said. “No one’s coming to help you.”

“Fuck _you_ ,” Devlin said.

This time, instead of a physical swat, Harry pointed his wand at Devlin’s foot. Concentrated. Slowly rolled his wrist to the outside.

The screaming was even louder this time as Devlin’s foot twisted in tandem.

Harry let the magic drop. “Just answer the question already.”

“What does it matter?” Draco said. “Just wipe them already.”

“I’m curious.” Harry reminded himself of Barty for a second and fought the absurd impulse to laugh.

“Because—he’s…” Devlin trailed off, glaring furiously at Graham.

“You’re angry.” Graham’s voice had the tight kind of control that said he was barely keeping it together. “That I—did something bad. That I don’t fit your little picture of what people should be like.”

“Yes,” Pritchard hissed, glaring at his brother. “We’re _Gryffindors_ and _Hufflepuffs_. We’re _good_. We _help people.”_

“So do we,” Harry said, grinning. “Just, you know, not you.”

Carmichael spat at him.

“Creative,” Pansy sneered. “Harry, can we finish this up? I need to redo my nails, I’ve got blood under them.”

“Right, sorry.” He flicked one hand over his shoulder and took a long breath. The Dursleys and then Dumbledore and James and Thorne had broken something and it was hard, sometimes, to pretend otherwise. Especially when it came out like this. When someone hurt one of _his friends_ and his entire body turned to ice. Even now a little part of him couldn’t stand the thought of them seeing him like this and calling him a _freak_.

Draco, Justin, and Pansy stepped forward in tandem, brandishing the healing potions. Harry pulled his wand and started throwing healing charms at Devlin. The older boy screamed again as his compound fracture slid back into his leg and realigned with its other half, tearing skin along the way. Pansy and Justin sucked at healing magic but Draco was the best of all of them, hilariously. Between him and Harry they got the three older boys into a decent enough shape that the healing potions should be able to take care of them.

“We’ll tell,” Carmichael said. “What you—what you did—Nott, that was Dark magic, you fucking Death Eater spawn—”

“If you _do_ tell, you’ll have to admit that Theo only attacked you because you attacked Graham Pritchard in the first place,” Harry said. “All it would take is a memory modified by someone who they don’t know is a skilled Occlumens to show only the extent of Graham’s injuries. And then where would you be?”

“The Occlumens is him, by the way,” Justin said helpfully.

Devlin made a frightened noise.

A part of Harry wanted to leave them with their memories and let them wander around in terror so he could just _know_ how they were stewing—but that was stupid. It would invite revenge; it was an idiotic risk.

But it wasn’t necessarily all or nothing. “Let them keep their fear,” Harry said, standing.

Graham stepped a little bit closer to Harry, enough that he was just barely leaning into Harry’s side, as Draco and Theo and Pansy moved in. Pansy was best at Obliviate, and loved having a bit of wand-magic that she excelled at for once. Theo and Draco and Daphne were all quite good as well. Barty said that Obliviate was a strictly guided rudimentary form of Legilimency, and talent with the former indicated talent with the latter. The problem with Legilimency was that, unlike Occlumency, you really needed to be _taught_ instead of teaching yourself.

Harry knew three Legilimens and he didn’t trust any of them in the slightest.

 _“Obliviate_ ,” Draco and Theo said almost in unison. Their eyes and Devlin’s and Carmichael’s slid out of focus. Pansy took her time, fiddling with her wand and enjoying Pritchard’s stilted, wandless efforts to crawl away from her.

“Don’t be nice,” Graham said suddenly.

Pansy eyed him for a second, her bob cut swinging around her ears. “Wasn’t planning on it. _Obliviate.”_

Her eyes and Pritchard’s went glassy, too. Unlike his cronies, Pritchard twitched and whimpered while Pansy sorted through his brain. She’d practiced on Harry a few times, using her not-nice approach. It felt like a hurricane of razor-sharp ice shards tearing through your mind.

Graham flinched just a little.

Harry glanced down. The kid’s eyes were closed. “Do you need to leave?” he said, softly, so he didn’t interrupt anyone’s concentration.

“N-no.” Graham clenched his jaw, resolute. The effect was somewhat diminished by the baby fat he hadn’t quite grown out of but still a good effort. “They did—worse to me.”

Not quite true, but as Graham had never been subjected to either an Obliviate or a Legilimency attack, he didn’t know just how utterly creepy and dehumanizing it was to have someone sorting through your head. Harry didn’t correct him.

“Done.” Pansy stepped back, letting Pritchard fall to the ground with a _thump_. The marks on his body were already fading thanks to the blood-keyed healing potion. He’d be sore for a few days and so would the others but Pansy, Draco, and Theo knew to include an aversion to hospitals in their memory patches. It was weak, and wouldn’t last, being implanted by Obliviate rather than proper Legilimency, but it would keep them away from Pomfrey while the single dose of potion did its work.

Draco finished second and Theo last. A few _reparos_ on their robes and the job was done. Harry stuffed their wands in his pocket. “We _mobilicorpus_ them to the library.”

“Twins?” Justin said. “For a diversion.”

Theo was already digging out his journal. “I’m sure they’ll appreciate the outlet,” Harry said.

And did they ever. The explosion an hour later rocked the whole castle and set off thick, roiling greenish fog that filled every corridor and room so thickly it was difficult to walk without running into something. If you didn’t know the countercharm, it would swallow any and all light. Barty had seen the twins’ notes and suggested a tweak that would take all light energy and boost it back into the spell itself, so attempts to see through the smoke only made it last longer. The masterstroke was that if you breathed it in while asleep, you _stayed_ asleep for ages with no side effects.

_Eddie_

He woke up with a pounding headache.

For a few seconds he thought he was dreaming. But no, that made no sense, when you were dreaming you never realized it was a dream, so that meant he _was_ actually in the library despite having no memory of getting there, and he _was_ actually surrounded by vaguely noxious green smoke.

He frowned. He didn’t remember coming to the library… or… something else. Something he’d forgotten. Something that happened before this?

By squinting, Eddie could just make out two other people slumped over the table with him. Toby and Vic, right. They’d been doing… something this morning. Important. He looked at the books spread around the table. Homework maybe? Except homework didn’t usually make him full of self-righteous anger. Well, actually, sometimes, usually when that horrible Snape wrote him nasty comments about his “deplorably rigid thinking,” which had happened just this morning, so maybe it was that?

He batted at the fog. Reached for his wand and panicked for a second before he realized it was in his right pocket instead of his left. Weird. He’d been left-handed his entire life, that wasn’t something you just _forgot_ …

“Hey,” he said. “Toby—Vic—wake up.”

Toby was the first one to come around, groaning. He looked about as shitty as Eddie felt. “What… the fuck… happened?”

“Weasley twins, probably,” Eddie said. “They’ve been quiet for a few weeks, prob’ly planning this.”

“Huh.” Toby blinked a few times. “That… makes sense, actually. Hey, Vic, wake up, check out this prank!”

“Wha…. _whoa._ ” Vic stared around with stupid amazement. Eddie sometimes wished his best friend was smarter but then again Vic had always been nice to him. Vic was his best friend. Vic couldn’t help it if he wasn’t the brightest; Eddie would stick by him regardless.

Even if it meant putting up with Tobias Pritchard, who for all he came from a great family, wasn’t the nicest guy ever.

Eddie shook that thought away, too. Toby was Vic’s friend, so he was Eddie’s by extension.

“Ow,” Toby said, laughing as he got to his feet. “Damn, guys, I am _sore_. Pickup Quidditch yesterday must’ve taken more out of me than I thought… Oi, Vic, let’s go, we can finish that game of chess.”

“Right,” Vic said, getting to his feet too.

“In the—your common room?” Eddie said.

Toby glanced at him. “Yeah, of course, where else? Although if it’s as foggy as _this_ we might have a hard time seeing the board.”

“I dunno, Toby.” Vic frowned, glancing at Eddie.

Vic clearly wanted to go, though, and he’d confided in Eddie about his family pressuring him to get closer to the Pritchards. “Go on,” Eddie said, smiling brightly. It was about ninety percent sincere. “I know you’ll have fun. See you at dinner, yeah?”

“Of course.” Vic grinned at him and collected his stuff, following Toby out of the library.

The fog seemed to muffle sound. Eddie hated how alone he felt isolated in this corner—which wasn’t his usual study corner, and wasn’t that odd? He jammed his things into his bag and hurried out as quickly as possible. In the Hufflepuff common room, it was impossible to be alone, even in fog as thick as this.

Although it turned out that the fog was impeded by the common room entrances, so there was only a faintly greenish haziness to the air once Eddie got past the barrels. He breathed a sigh of relief.

He really did feel awful. His whole body was aching like _hell_. Maybe he was getting ill or something; those weird kneazle viruses from the States always made him feel achy when he caught one.

Across the common room, he caught a glimpse of a familiar face. Eddie’s stomach did something unpleasant. Justin Finch-Fletchley, Muggle-born, not that you’d know it to look at him. He was reclined in a chair with all the insouciant grace of a pureblood heir, chatting with Hannah Abbott and Zoey Hughes. Finch-Fletchley’s robes were of fine make, tailored, and looked well-worn. Eddie frowned. He’d never liked the kid much. He befriended far too many Slytherins.

The fifth year looked up just then and locked eyes with Eddie across the common room. Eddie blanched and terror took a vicious grip on his lungs and his pulse skyrocketed—

Finch-Fletchley’s face broke into a grin and he waved briefly before going back to whatever conversation he’d been having with the girls.

Eddie took a steadying breath, barely noticing that several other badgers were staring at him with worry, or that he was stopped dead in the middle of the common room clutching his book bag like a lifeline. That was stupid. Clearly he wasn’t sleeping enough, or maybe he had low blood sugar, or both of those plus the onset of a kneazle virus. Finch-Fletchley hadn’t glared at him or anything; had been perfectly nice, just like he always was. There was no reason for that stupid fear response.

It was probably just another weird part of this already weird day. The stupid Weasley Terrors’ latest prank was having some side effects, Eddie decided, and stumbled off to his dormitory. He’d sleep it off and be back to normal the next day.

It took a while for his awful, irrational fear to subside.

When he woke up a few hours later for dinner, Eddie climbed out of bed feeling not at all rested. “You were having some awful dreams, mate,” his roommate said. “Thrashing and twitching all over the place. You okay?”

“Yeah,” Eddie said. “Just… coming down with something, I think.”

“You should go to Pomfrey. Get a checkup.”

That made sense, but—“No, I’m good.” Eddie just didn’t want to go to the hospital wing. He was fine, dammit, he just needed more sleep and a few days to get over this virus. “I’ll tough it out, I’ve got some Pepper-Up in my trunk.”

“If you’re sure. C’mon, we’ll miss dinner.”

He let himself be dragged up to the Great Hall for dinner and didn’t even notice that he avoided looking at the Slytherin table all the way through.

_Theo_

They made it back to the common room without a hitch, burned Theo’s bloodstained robes to get rid of any possible evidence, changed, and made it up to dinner. He watched Pritchard, Carmichael, and especially Devlin throughout dinner in a way that Daphne said made him look like a predator. He playfully snapped his teeth at her and she laughed.

(She was a predator, too, underneath the pretty hair and ice queen mask.)

All three older boys avoided looking at the Slytherin table. Theo knew full well he was practically radiating smugness by the time they finished dessert.

“What’s up with _him?”_ Everett asked at one point, eyes on the faintly green Eddie Carmichael.

“Had some fun this afternoon,” Theo said with a wide smile.

Harry looked between him and Everett. “Just a spot of extracurricular spellwork.”

“Ah.” ‘Extracurricular’ was practically Slytherin code for ‘illegal and/or dangerous.’ Everett understood perfectly well and returned to his food.

After dinner, Draco chased the beefcakes out of the dormitory, Daphne and Pansy came over with Pansy’s demon fox in tow, and Harry relayed the whole story in a perfectly even tone.

Daphne glared. “And you didn’t invite me?”

“You didn’t respond in the journal,” Harry said.

She glared harder. “Next time, invite me.”

“Done.” Harry ran absent hands over Eriss draped around his shoulders.

“Graham?” Pansy said.

Harry sighed a bit. “Got him back to the younger Vipers. Veronica and Malcolm were freaking out with worry. He’ll… he’s adjusting but he’ll be fine.”

“He’s not going back to that house,” Draco said. “Right? Father will back you, I’ll write him first thing in the morning. Theo—does this have anything to do with the recent spat between your father and Lord Pritchard?”

 _More observant than you seem, Draco, maybe there’s hope yet._ “Maybe.”

Draco nodded.

_Theo_

Theo woke up sometime that night, blinking sleep out of his eyes. For a few seconds he wasn’t sure what had woken him, and then a bit of light shot across his curtains for a few seconds as someone opened and then closed the door.

He followed without a thought.

Harry was sitting by the fire, Eriss on his shoulders. She stirred when Theo stepped into the otherwise-empty common room. Playfully, he snapped his teeth at Eriss, and she flashed her razor-sharp fangs back at him, their own little gesture of greeting. He was pretty sure Harry didn’t know about it.

Fire danced in his friend’s eyes when Theo stepped around the couch, turning them from green to crimson. Theo sat down and waited in silence for Harry to either tell him to leave, say something else, or just let him stay.

Harry seemed happy with the silence so Theo just dragged a blanket over his legs.

Then again… he _was_ curious. “Do you enjoy it?” he said eventually.

“Hurting them?”

Theo nodded.

“Not in and of itself.” Harry shrugged. Eriss hissed at him for the movement and sulkily slid down to rest in his lap. “They hurt Graham. So I don’t _regret_ it. I didn’t hesitate. I’m glad I did it because it’ll keep my people safe.”

“Mm.” That was more or less what Theo’d figured.

Harry blinked and looked away from the fire. For once, all his masks were gone, leaving nothing but the broken, hungry, power-starved boy Theo had first met in Diagon. When he got like this his eyes looked kind of dead and empty even though they gleamed as creepily green as ever. “You do.”

“Yep.” No point denying _that._ Theo smiled involuntarily, reliving hurting those three boys. His father had seen this smile on his face one time and promptly ordered him to never let anyone see it again.

“Sadism.”

“Problem?”

“I’m hardly one to talk.” Harry raised one hand and the firelight caught it and turned his skin reddish for just a second. “Aim it in the right direction.”

And that didn’t even need an answer. Theo knew perfectly well that he could be pretty fucking twisted. Father had seen it and drilled into him from a very young age that actions rather than abilities or desires were what mattered. It wasn’t like he was out of control, or addicted to hurting people. Theo was just careful to draw lines in his head that he would not cross and hold himself to them, lines that kept his behavior in reasonable boundaries and made sure he wouldn’t end up a front-page headline: _Nott Heir Discovered Torturing Animals_ or some such. It might not be a socially acceptable moral code but it was his and it worked.

“Thank you. For being there for Graham.”

“He’s a Viper,” Theo said.

Harry nodded. Then one of his many masks slipped back into place and he smirked, transformed in a second into a typical mischievous teenage boy. “So’s Hermione.”

“Sod off,” Theo said, hitting his best friend with a pillow.

“Nah, c’mon, how are you guys?”

Theo huffed and flopped back on the couch. Hermione’s bushy hair and bossy voice drifted in his head and he smiled again. “Good. We’re good. We argue, though. A lot.”

“You always have,” Harry agreed, snickering. “Too academic, the both of you.”

“Hey. Books are great. You can learn a lot from books. And you’re hardly one to talk, Lord Traveling Library.”

Harry laughed. “I concede.”

“I dunno if we’ll last, though,” Theo admitted.

“Why not?”

He considered how to put it for a few seconds. “We’re almost… too similar? Too stubborn. Too academic. I… care about her… but.”

“Always the _buts_ ,” Harry said morosely. “I’m starting to think romance is a waste of time.”

“We’ve got plenty of it,” Theo said. “Unlike some other families, mine’s always been careful about inbreeding, and the Potters haven’t batted an eye at halfbloods or foreigners marrying in. Nothing to shorten our life spans. You and I have many decades ahead of us.” He could just see it, too. Whether the Dark Lord won or lost, Harry would come out of it with Theo at his side, and they’d get their Masteries and take their Wizengamot seats and worm their way into the upper echelons of power. Power that was Theo’s by birth and merit.

“Plenty of time,” Harry agreed. “Plenty of things to learn and people to outwit.”

Theo laughed softly. Eriss slipped across the sofa between them, butting her head happily into Theo’s leg. He ran a hand over her cool scales and she allowed him the contact before returning to Harry.

“Vipers was a good name.”

“Wasn’t it just?” Harry scooped up his familiar. “Clever of Justin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: That bit about hyperactive scar tissue is entirely unnecessary but I’m a science nerd so I couldn’t help but work it in. Humans have really hyperactive scar tissue and it’s one of the reasons we as a species have survived this long. Injuries that would kill most other mammals from shock, blood loss, or slow healing will fail to kill a human. Our shock resistance upon traumatic injury is also off the charts. In this case, magic accelerates and improves upon what the body would do naturally, but healing potions in particular work best with the natural processes instead of supplanting them. Ergo, somewhat less prominent scar tissue, but still scar tissue. 
> 
> A/N 2: Obliviate victims don’t normally have a sense of “something forgotten” etc. The kids are still amateurs with that curse. They did a pretty good job but not a perfectly clean one.


	4. Ch 18

_Jules_

“I can’t _believe_ Hagrid’s on probation!”

“Bloody ridiculous.” Ron didn’t seem to mind Lavender’s shrill voice, somehow. “That old hag’s had it out for all Dumbledore’s people since the beginning.”

That Jules could get on board with. He looked around the common room, noted only Fred and George sitting nearby mucking about with one of their Headless Hats, and cast the anti-eavesdropping spell Moody taught him.

It took a second before he noticed Neville, curled up by the windows with a book that he didn’t seem to be reading. Jules felt bad.

“You need to train the DA harder,” Toby said, voice low. “Jules—it’s a great thing you’re doing and all—we need to know how to defend ourselves—but it’s got to be more. And now there’s this lot on the loose.”

“You okay, mate?” Ron said.

Parvati peered at Toby. “You’re looking a bit peaky.”

“I’m fine,” Toby said, brushing their concerns off. “Had a bit of a crash in a pickup Quidditch match a few days ago, it’s nothing.”

“And now we have to deal with that new Educational Decree,” Lavender sighed.

“The teachers are being decent about it, though,” Jules said. “I keep seeing them talking in corners—the staff room’s not safe with the toad lurking around. And I saw Flitwick tell Umbridge during his inspection that he couldn’t teach us about the Ministry’s awesomeness because it “wasn’t relevant to his class” or whatever the latest decree was.”

That got a round of laughs.

 _“And_ the DA is doing better,” Parvati said. It was kind of hard to focus on what she was saying instead of on her lips. Jules pinched himself on the leg, hard. “If nothing else the breakout motivated people. And the older Ravenclaws made those parchments we can use to pass times along, that’ll help coordinate.”

“You’d think that catastrophe at Azkaban would motivate _her_ ,” Ben Creed said, “but _nooo_ … Umbitch.”

Jules snorted.

“What?” Ben said.

“Ah… just… you call her that and so did Harry last week.” Did Toby just flinch? Weird.

“Don’t compare me to _him_ ,” Ben said, disgusted. “I know he’s your brother, mate, but he’s bloody creepy.”

Jules kicked his own reservations about Harry aside. “He’s not got it easy, you know, dealing with the snakes all the time.”

“Sure doesn’t seem to have problems,” Ron muttered.

“Get over it, Ron,” Parvati said. Jules grinned at her.

“And what about Ethan?” Toby again. “Jules, I saw that letter you got this morning…”

The anger he’d been pushing down all day almost snapped. Jules’ fists clenched.

“Sore subject,” Ron advised.

The group fell silent.

“ _Azkaban,”_ Jules finally growled. It came out thick and forced. Something hot was choking his throat.

Everyone gasped in unison. “No,” Ron said, eyes wide.

Jules slammed his eyelids shut before he either started shouting or crying. “Yeah. For… a year. He’ll be out February fourth.”

_One year. Twelve months in Azkaban._

“Black managed twelve years,” Parvati said determinedly. “Ethan’s got some Occlumency, right?”

“He does.” Ron nodded and started unwrapping a chocolate frog. “James told me last summer.”

“Fucking Occlumency,” Jules half-snarled. The lessons with Snape left him tense and aching mentally and physically.

“Dumbledore knows what’s best,” Lavender said, sounding a bit lecturing.

Jules glared at her. “Yeah, well, Dumbledore says what’s best for me but he can’t be bothered to _talk_ to me can he!”

His voice had risen to a shout by the end of the outburst and everyone stared at him.

“Jules, calm down,” Parvati said, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Dumbledore is a great man. If he’s avoiding you, I’m sure he has his reasons. He’s probably busy with the Order and fighting… fighting You-Know-Who.”

“I know,” Jules grumbled, slumping a little. She was right. Dumbledore _was_ great and leading the Order against Voldemort was a lot for anyone to handle, especially while also running a school. “Still. He’s always been around, ever since I was little… Teaching me spells and talking about history. It’s just… weird to have him so distant. And Dad’s a mess ‘cause of Ethan.”

“Well.” Parvati stiffened her spine. “If Black can survive twelve _years_ then Ethan will be fine after a year. He’ll stuff his face with chocolate, laze around Potter Manor for a month or two, and be right back in fighting form.” She yanked out a piece of parchment. “In the meantime, you need to sort out what the DA’s working on next.”

“Stunners,” Jules said reflexively—he’d been thinking about this last week. “We can work on Stunning Spells and Protego Charms together, teach people how to put more power into both spells. And it’s good practice with Cushioning Charms. I was thinking about having the sixth and seventh years try it all silently—probably too hard for under NEWT level students.”

Eager smiles took over his friends’ faces. Jules sat up straighter and forced away his worry about Ethan, Dad, Dumbledore, Voldemort, Harry. This he could do. He could teach people to defend themselves and have a group of friends he trusted to fight with him.

Because war was coming and everyone needed to be ready and if he had to sit in school while Voldemort ran around recruiting werewolves and giants, then Jules was going to do whatever small part he could from _inside_ Hogwarts’ walls.

“Anyway.” Parvati leaned forward. “I was thinking we could even talk about potions in the next DA meeting.”

Ron, Jules, Toby, and Lavender made faces in unison.

“Why’s that?” said Dean, who’d been silent up until now, like usual. He and Seamus were sitting close together just inside the silencing spell.

“Potions can be used in battle.” Parvati tossed her hair. Jules’ eyes got stuck on its sleek black length and the way it draped over the back of her sofa… “If you down a Strengthening Solution beforehand, well, _that’s_ obvious. Stamina Draughts can be great if you’re in a long period of high stress. Pepper-Up, Invigorating Draught… catch my drift?”

“But then we’d have to _make_ them,” Ron said.

Toby shook his head. “I’m not doing anything to do with that greasy bat’s class. I get enough of Potions in the dungeons, thanks.”

“It doesn’t make sense to pass up a chance like that just ‘cause we hate the git who’s been teaching it to us,” Jules said firmly. “Parvati, maybe you could take point on that? Only if people want to.”

“We’d need some kind of Unbreakable Charm on the vials.” Parvati whipped out a notebook and bent over it, her long, graceful fingers wrapping around the front cover to stabilize it while she scribbled. “I’ll get Angelina to cast that for me… Ooooh, and lots of cauldrons… I wonder if the Room will keep potions brewing while I’m not there…? Can I recruit other people?”

Jules blinked and mentally slapped himself. “Er, yeah, of course… Who d’you have in mind?”

Out of the girls’ line of sight, Toby leered and made a crude gesture. Jules scowled at him. Ben, Ron, and Toby laughed silently and Jules had to fight back a grin.

“Dean.”

The Muggle-born jumped and looked away from Seamus. “What?”

Parvati pointed her quill at him and Dean looked vaguely alarmed. “You’re good at Potions, right?”

“I’m… all right,” Dean said uncomfortably. “Neville and Hermione are better.”

“Yes, I’m aware, I’ll be dragging them in too,” Parvati said. She appeared to be jotting down a list of names. “You’ve been working with Black lately, haven’t you?”

Toby blanched and glared at Dean.

“I mean. Sometimes I sit at the same table as him,” Dean said. “Usually ‘cause Neville saved me a spot.”

“Details.” Parvati dismissed that with a wave. “You still work with by far the top Potions student in our year. Keep note of any tips he drops, we can probably use them.”

Dean shifted a bit, and Seamus glanced at him with a slight frown. “Yeah, okay, I can do that,” Dean said.

“Great!” Parvati beamed at them. “I think that’s it for tonight, guys. Lav, want to help me with this?”

“Eugh, no.” Lavender sniffed. “Potions smell nasty and clog my pores, thanks. I’ll help manage the logistics of it and that’s it. _But_ I would love your input on the uniforms.”

Jules blinked. That was new. “Uniforms?”

“Yes,” Lavender said, looking down her nose at him. “It’s very important for a group to have a sense of unity! And if we ever get into a _real_ fight, we’ve got to know who’s one of us!”

“Er. Okay,” Jules said.

“No masks,” Ron added.

Everyone nodded.

Jules took down the privacy spells and the group scattered. It was late, and Jules had homework he hadn’t done, but the DA was frankly way more important than his grades. He’d charm notes out of Parvati or Hermione before the exams.

Speaking of which. “Parvati,” he said, catching lightly at his ex-girlfriend’s wrist to stop her.

She paused. Jules tilted his head towards a nook by the windows, a question in his eyes. Parvati sighed and nodded, following him over to the secluded spot.

“What?” she asked. “I’ve got things to do…”

“Parvati, I…” Jules ran a hand through his hair like he’d seen Dad do a million times. “Things got awkward between us but… I miss you.”

“I’m right here.” Parvati looked coolly at him. “We’re better off as friends, Jules. I told you that when I broke it off.”

“But…”

“No. Listen.” She sighed, and softened a bit. “I’ve known you since we were kids. I like you. I trust you. I believe you and I’ll fight at your back against You-Know-Who. But there was just no… spark. And I want that.”

“No _spark?”_ Jules stared at her. She hadn’t gone into details during their break-up—had said it was too painful, and then started crying, and he was bloody useless around crying girls so he hadn’t pushed the issue too hard. But this was ridiculous. He was the bloody Boy Who Lived. “You—I’m not _interesting_ enough!”

Parvati made a frustrated noise. “Of course you’re _interesting!_ Things are always _interesting_ around you. I just know you too well. We are _friends_ , and that’s too important to throw away on a relationship that just wasn’t working. I love you, Jules, but as a—cousin or something. Not a boyfriend. Okay?”

Jules swallowed. No, it wasn’t okay, he still cared about her and couldn’t stop thinking about her and—but if she felt that way then that was her call and he would deal with it. “Okay. Friends.”

“Thank you,” she said softly, smiling. For a second she looked like she’d hug him, just like when they were younger, or like when they were dating, but then she seemed to think better of it and just rested a hand lightly on his shoulder. “Remember to clear your mind before you sleep. Snape’s an arsehole but Occlumency is still really useful and it’s good to know.”

Jules fought down a scowl as his anger at Snape came roaring back. Honestly, sometimes he didn’t know how Dad managed not to kill the bastard in school. “I’ll try.”

“Good. See you tomorrow,” Parvati said, and then she was slipped up the staircase in a whirl of robes. The orange practically glowed against her brown skin.

Jules watched her go and swallowed his rioting emotions and went up to his own dorm.

_FW_

_Harry, we overheard an interesting conversation in the dorms tonight._

_HB_

_Do tell_

_GW_

_Well, we had to take down some of Jules’ privacy spells first._

_FW_

_Nasty work. We think he learned it from Moody._

_GW_

_But anyway. They were talking about the DA…_

_Harry_

Barty picked up the box. “What’s this?”

“Letters.” Harry sat down in his usual seat. He’d gone back to the normal arrangements after the confrontation over the Longbottoms and Barty never mentioned it. “From people whose families just escaped.”

“You’re playing owl?” Barty said with a smirk.

Harry snorted. Barty knew perfectly well what this move meant in Slytherin politics, and why Harry had played it.

“Who’s in here?”

“Ah… there’s one for Iona Nielsen, Septimus Travers, Danica Bulstrode, Felix Rowle, the Gables, Bryanne Carrow and Ericus Burke from the Carrow twins, and Culan Fawley. Oh, and Corvus Viridian, I reached out to Iris. They’re warded for their recipients.”

“Nicely done.” Barty tapped the box with his wand, shrunk it, and tucked it into his pocket. “Did you finish the book on arithmancy in different cultures?”

Harry put said book on the table. “I had a question about the bit in chapter four about the Middle East’s mixture of arithmancy techniques. Why would the Silk Road have affected wizarding knowledge? Binns said it was almost exclusively a Muggle trade route.”

“Good question.” Barty leaned forward, eyes gleaming. “It has to do with magical products needing much more power to Floo or Apparate, which in turn makes the products unstable.”

“Soooo. Harry.” Pansy plopped down across from him at the table with a grin. “Who are you taking to Hogsmeade?”

“What?” Harry blinked at her over his breakfast.

“Valentine’s Day, idiot. It’s in two weeks. Who are you taking?”

He frowned. “How in Merlin’s name did a Muggle saint’s day end up a wizarding holiday?”

“Sweet Circe,” Daphne sighed, elbowing him. “Just when I think we’ve got you caught up, you go and ask questions like this.”

Harry glowered at her. Blaise was clearly not awake enough to help, Theo had his nose in a very dusty book of runes, and Draco was nowhere to be seen. Probably still working on his hair.

“Saint Valentin was a wizard,” Hestia said, leaning around Daphne. “The Muggles thought he was two men—a Roman emperor executed him twice, three years apart. First time he survived—no one’s quite sure how.” She sneered. “Whatever Muggle religion called him a martyr and named him saint. There’s rumors Valentin was attacking the Romans’ bloody celebration; it involved sacrificing animals and then beating women with them for fertility.”

An appalled silence followed. _“What?”_ Harry said.

“’S true,” Blaise said, looking marginally more awake. This may have been because of the coffee in his hand or the gory nature of their conversation. “The Muggles had this bastardized version of a fertility rite for newlyweds. Turned it into this disgusting mess. Valentin was going after them for mocking magical traditions.”

“Then later religious leaders combined it with this other holiday to ‘convert the pagans’ or some bullshit and now we have this commercialized disaster,” Pansy finished. “Most wizards don’t even celebrate it anymore, unless they’re newly married or struggling to conceive.”

“Then why…” Harry waved his hand at the Valentine’s-themed food, the pink candles, and the hearts flashing all over Dumbledore’s robes. It wasn’t as bad as second year when Lockhart got involved, but that didn’t mean much.

“Have a guess,” Everett said with a smirk.

Harry sighed. “Dumbledore.”

“Give the boy a prize,” Everett said.

“Not sure a prize from you means much, as you’ve yet to best me in a duel,” Harry said with a cutting smile.

Everett sneered, but they all knew who’d won that round.

“If you’re finished playing with the children, care to answer my question?” Pansy’s tone was dangerously sweet.

“No one,” Harry said.

She squeaked. “No one—! Do you _have_ a functioning brain in there? Have you even realized how people look at you?”

Harry looked over her shoulder at the Ravenclaw table and caught a random girl’s eye. It turned out to be Diggory’s girlfriend, Cho Chang. He made like he’d just been skimming the table, jerked his eyes back to hers, and let the contact draw out for just a second before offering his best charismatic smile. Chang blushed, looked down, and peeked back up at him under her eyebrows. Seeing him still looking, she blushed harder.

“I think he’s got it, yeah,” Blaise said drily. “Appreciate you not trying that on Iris, mate.”

“Aren’t you still snogging Luna?” Pansy said innocently.

Blaise twitched. Interest and quiet snickers spread around them. “How—never mind. Of course you knew. And yes, but still. Luna and I are _just_ snogging. No emotions involved.”

“Riiiight,” Pansy said.

“So glad you agree,” Blaise said with a perfectly innocent smile. Harry wished Theo were here; he’d have looked at Harry with a smirk that said _he’s probably killed someone wearing that smile._

Pansy narrowed her eyes at him. Blaise serenely ate a bowl of cut fruit.

“Harry, please just put Pansy out of her misery,” Daphne said with a small grin. “Why are you going stag?”

“No one I’m interested in,” Harry said. “It’s not that complicated.”

Pansy heaved a theatrical sigh. “Fine. Daph?”

“I have a date.”

“ _Who?”_

Daphne let out a dainty gasp. “Does the gossip queen not _know_? Pansy, dear, you’re slipping.”

“I am _not_.”

Harry tuned out their bickering. He didn’t see why it was such a big deal to go to Hogsmeade on his own, if there was no girl he particularly cared for.

He was sitting in the Three Broomsticks with a crowd of assorted Vipers from second year to seventh when the interview happened.

“Hey, everyone, shut up!” someone bellowed.

Sam and Mason cut off their spirited argument about how far back Flitwick’s goblin blood came from. Hestia and Flora’s heads snapped up in unison, eyes narrowing at the bar as Madam Rosmerta cranked the radio in response to her customers’ loud demands.

Harry wanted to groan or drop his head into his hands as Jules’ voice came over the radio.

“…good to be on your show, Mr. Rhyme, thanks for having me.”

 _“How the hell did he get on Rhyme and Reason?”_ Theo hissed.

“Do you actually listen to that conspiracy-theory shit?” Blaise said incredulously. “Even _Luna_ thinks it’s ridiculous.”

“Their theories are wild but it’s still fun to make fun of them—”

Harry leveled a scathing glare at them and shut them both up.

Mr. Rhyme was speaking now in his awful, nasally voice. Whenever Theo tuned his wireless to _Rhyme & Reason_, Harry made him put up silencing charms. “…an honor to speak with the Savior of the Wizarding World!”

“Thanks, Mr. Rhyme.” Harry could _hear_ the smile in Jules’ voice. He really was good at public appearances, even though they’d been few and far between in the last year or two.

Mr. Reason’s oily, excitable voice came next. The Three Broomsticks was quieter than Harry had ever heard it. Even Rosmerta had quit her work behind the counter. “We’ve some questions to ask you today, dear boy, if you’d be so kind?”

“Of course. That’s why I’m here, after all.”

“Indeed, indeed…”

Rhyme jumped back in. “First up! How has the recent ream of Ministry stories made you feel? Betrayed? Distraught? Misunderstood?”

Harry’s fingers itched for his journal.

“None of the above,” Jules said. “Only more determined to make sure I can protect myself and other people in the face of what’s coming. I’ve always had people who don’t like me—comes with being in the press all the time. When I was eight, I tripped down a set of stairs, and there were some stories about how the Boy Who Lived shouldn’t be such a klutz.”

A round of chuckles echoed tinnily out of the speakers. “Quite right, quite right,” Reason said. “We’ve had our share of detractors too, and I imagine we always will. The balance has been a bit different here, far more detractors and fewer supporters…”

“Although that’s changed recently,” Rhyme said with a light laugh.

Jules echoed it. “Well, so goes public opinion, I guess. But I do still have plenty of loyal supporter and I am so thankful for all their help. The Ministry might be trying to keep things hushed up but anyone who’s believed me, anyone who’s willing to face hard truths… Thank you. Our world needs you.”

_HB_

_Jules is on Rhyme & Reason right now giving an interview. Tune in if you can. _

_Hermione—do you still have Skeeter in a jar?_

“And what hard truths might those be, Mr. Potter?” Reason’s voice was practically quivering with anticipation.

Jules paused for a long second in which the only sound in the pub was the wireless’ hum of ambient magic.

“Voldemort is back.”

Multiple people gasped, flinched, shrieked, dropped their food, or slopped drinks down themselves. One of the waitresses dumped an entire tray of butterbeer on the ground. Madam Rosmerta, Harry noted, was one of few who didn’t react with more than a twitch.

“I know a lot of people don’t want to hear it.” Jules was undeterred but at least he’d had the sense to pause so people could recollect themselves. “I know the Ministry’s calling me an attention-seeking fraud, a glory hound, um…”

“An unstable, dangerous lunatic in need of a private room in St. Mungo’s mental ward?” Rhyme said. “I read that one last week.”

Jules’ chuckle would probably sound real to anyone who didn’t know him. Harry was reluctantly impressed. “That one was pretty good, yeah. But I _saw him_. I don’t know if anyone knows Auror Alastor Moody personally but if you do, you’ll probably notice he’s even more paranoid lately. That’s because last year, Death Eater Barty Crouch Jr. escaped his father’s control and took Auror Moody’s identity all year. He taught us at Hogwarts, using Polyjuice and Veritaserum to be a perfect fake. He turned the Triwizard Cup into a Portkey.”

“I do remember an interview with Mr. Bagman during the third task that the cup was supposed to collapse the hedge maze and freeze all challenges within,” Reason said.

“Exactly. That was the plan. Crouch messed it up,” Jules said.

“But this is all the same as the Ministry’s story,” Rhyme prompted.

“Yeah… well, when we got to the graveyard… it wasn’t Mulciber waiting for us. It was Peter Pettigrew and Voldemort.”

More gasps.

“Peter Pettigrew,” Reason said. “The very same who betrayed your family and framed Lord Sirius Black for the crime?”

“Yep. He bolted as a rat—he’s an illegal Animagus, probably just so he could spy, Dad reckons Voldemort used Dark magic to influence Pettigrew’s animal form—and went straight back to his master.” Jules’ disgust was obvious in his voice. “Harry—my estranged brother, Heir Black—he and I were tied up. Pettigrew used some kind of potion to bring Voldemort back from a… well, he wasn’t really dead, but he wasn’t fully alive. Some kind of weak half-state in a child-sized body. He’s been possessing various animals for years. Sometimes people. Barely hanging around. They used… the bone of the enemy, flesh of the servant, blood of the enemy to make Voldemort a new body.”

“Incredible,” Reason breathed. “That’s advanced Dark magic of a sort very, very few can practice…”

“Were you scared?” Rhyme butted in.

Jules laughed. “Terrified.”

Amusement rippled through the pub.

_HG_

_I let her out over the holidays, actually. She’s writing under a pseudonym and nothing inflammatory. Daphne and I have her on a tight leash. Why?_

“You? Gryffindor’s scion, Heir Potter, the Boy Who Lived, terrified?” Rhyme said.

Jules snorted. “I’d be an idiot if I wasn’t. It’s _Voldemort_ , and I was tied up and wandless. But courage isn’t _not_ being afraid, it’s acting even when you’re so scared you think maybe you can’t even move.” 

“Wise words,” Reason said.

“However did you escape?” Rhyme said.

“Eh, Voldemort summoned his Death Eaters and grandstanded a bit, explaining where he’d been for so long. He looked into their minds and made sure they were still loyal, using Legilimency. Then he was about to kill me but Harry had a burst of accidental magic, and undid the ropes. I grabbed my wand. And then… we dueled.”

“You and the Death Eaters?” Rhyme said breathlessly.

Jules snorted again. “Nah, Harry distracted them, destroyed half the graveyard. He only lasted a few seconds but it was enough for—for a stray curse to hit Macnair.”

Several Vipers shot Harry worried looks. Graham, Veronica, and Malcolm were the most obvious about it, being the youngest and least experienced at hiding their emotions. For his part, Harry kept his rage carefully tucked away. Jules was keeping some lies in the narrative. But then again, Harry _had_ committed murder. It didn’t matter so much which name Jules stuck with. And Jules was bound by the Order’s story, which hadn’t been Jules’ decision to make.

And in this case, he was clinging to the Order’s version.

“And for me to fight Voldemort. Our wands have the same core,” Jules said.

“Idiot,” Blaise whispered. “Who just _announces_ that?!”

“He shot an Avada at me. I tried to disarm him. Our spells connected and… something happened, like a cage of light. Professor Dumbledore says it’s the Priori Incantatem effect. Harry was out at this point but me dueling Voldemort distracted them, so he was just immobilized on the ground.

“Then the Priori Incantatem broke. Everyone was distracted, Voldemort and I were both unconscious, and Harry grabbed me and summoned the Cup and Portkeyed us back to school.”

Silence fell.

“That’s… quite the story, Mr. Potter,” Reason said delightedly. “And it’s all true?”

“Every word.” Credit where credit was due and all—Jules actually managed to sound confident and in control. “Lots of people don’t want to hear it, but I swear it’s true—every word.”

“In that case, why has your brother not spoken up?”

Jules hesitated. “He… it was a terrifying night. The whole fight reminded him too much of some things that are hard for him to talk about. We agreed that I’d take point with the press so he could keep a low profile.” Cue self-deprecating laugh. “Neither of us likes the attention very much, but he’s lucky; he can dodge it better than me.”

 _Oh, you bastard_. Lots of fake-furtive looks sneaked Harry’s way from around the pub. His Vipers pulled a bit closer, glowering around, but he cast a quick glare around the group so they’d back off. It was only to be expected.

This group in the pub, he didn’t give a shit about. The problem was going to be the fallout in Slytherin. Chapman might be a problem, possibly Seaton, since Harry was moving in to the upper echelons of the Slytherin hierarchy and they’d look to shoot him down. Jules had just painted a neon arrow pointing straight towards Harry’s shit childhood, which was a weakness the older Slytherins hadn’t tried to exploit yet. 

Harry rubbed his temples. It wasn’t Jules’ fault; he was oblivious to Slytherin politics and this was a rebellion against the Order’s deliberate attempts to paint him as the useless and unstable afterthought in that battle, whose attempts to help included accidental magic, an unintentional homicide, and a Summoning Charm, and who wouldn’t talk about it because he had _jumbled memories._

Theo stomped on his foot under the table. Harry refocused.

“…recommended course of action?”

“Well, people just need to be aware of the danger,” Jules said. “That’s the most important part. Brush up on defensive spells, strengthen your home wards, stock food and water in your home, maybe start a dueling club or something in your town. Any little bit helps and there’s plenty of people out there who are brave, and good, and ready to stand up for themselves, if they only have a chance to prepare.”

“Thank you, Mr. Potter,” Reason said. “It’s been a delight to speak to you today. Perhaps again sometime in the future?”

“As opposed to in the past?” Rhyme said with a laugh. Harry raised an eyebrow; the man had actually sounded a bit sinister there instead of airy and harmless.

Jules laughed, too, and it only sounded fake. “Well, I’m pretty busy this year, but I’ll keep you guys in mind. Thanks again!”

Rhyme and Reason fell into their usual sign-off spiel. The pub promptly exploded into conversation with not a few patrons staring unabashedly in Harry’s direction.

“Bugger,” Daphne sighed so only Harry and Theo could hear.

_HP_

_I think it’s time we let her off that leash a bit. Just make sure she’s pointed in the right direction._

“Black!”

Harry closed his eyes for a half-second, checked his step, and glanced over his shoulder. “Melvin, hello.”

“None of that bullshit,” Melvin sneered. He was a sixth year but a mediocre and unimportant one Harry had never bothered with. It was confusing for a second until Harry caught the glint of Seaton’s eyes, watching from the fireplace. 

Instead of rise to the bait, Harry merely raised an eyebrow and said, “I’ve just had a rather long day and I’d prefer to go work on some schoolwork, so if this isn’t urgent…”

“Oh,” Melvin said, “it’s _urgent_ , all right. What’s this about you fighting the Dark Lord?”

Harry stared at the boy. “What’s this I hear about you being re-sorted into Gryffindor?”

Melvin froze. So did about half the common room—ha, so much for pretending not to listen. That was a deadly insult in the snake pit.

 _“What_ did you say?” Melvin said.

“Oh, sorry.” Harry knew he didn’t sound very sorry. “It’s just, I heard a rumor, and I discounted it, of course, because the Sorting Hat’s had a thousand years of practice, but behavior like _that_ would suggest you really _do_ belong in the lions’ den.”

Melvin sputtered. “You—! You dare!”

Harry rolled his eyes and started to walk away. His close friends hadn’t even bothered to get up, knowing he could handle _Melvin_ of all people, but Hestia and Flora and Adrian were watching with canny intention. Waiting to see if Harry slipped up.

Only a reflection saved him. Harry caught the flicker of motion in a silver portrait frame near the entrance to the boys’ dormitory and cast a wandless, wordless _protego_ without even turning. Whatever Melvin had shot at him reflected into the ceiling.

Harry stopped dead. The entire common room held its breath.

Slowly, he turned around. Melvin appeared to have been shocked into silence, which was the only smart thing he’d done tonight. “How very stupid of you, Melvin,” he drawled. “Attack the Heir to the Most Ancient and Noble House of Black from behind in full view of about forty witnesses.” He swept an amused grin around the common room. “I honestly think he’s ended up in the wrong House. What d’you all say? Take him to Dumbledore and demand a re-Sort?”

That got lots of muffled laughter.

Melvin made some kind of choking noise of indignation, apparently beyond speech.

“Leave off, Melvin,” Harry said kindly, just to rub it in.

He went to his room, dropped off a vaguely interesting history book he’d picked up in Hogsmeade, collected two books spelled to look like fifth-year Charms work even though they were in fact NEWT-level, and took his usual spot in the common room. Everyone made a point of pretending the impromptu challenge never happened.

The only time it came up was when Harry said offhandedly, “Melvin enjoys flying, doesn’t he? Joins in some pickup games with the Ravenclaws occasionally?”

“Yeah,” Draco said, “he does…”

“Hm.” Harry didn’t look up from his book. Pansy changed the subject.

Harry was running late the next morning thanks to an _issue_ involving Eriss and two other castle snakes that, apparently, required his moderation because Eriss disliked killing another member of her species. It left him with a complaining stomach, a foul mood, and two minutes to get to the Great Hall.

So when Seaton accosted him right as Harry stepped into the common room, he could already tell this wouldn’t end well.

“Morning,” he said, forcing a cheerful expression onto his face.

“Morning, Black.” Seaton was standing directly in his path. “You heard your brother’s interview yesterday, I take it?”

“I imagine everyone has by now,” Harry said drily. “Subtlety is not Jules’ strong point.”

Seaton inclined his head. “Too true. You really did take all the intelligence from your parents’ gene pool.”

“Not that there was much to take, going off James’ example,” someone said in a nearby group of sixth years.

Seaton looked closely for offense, but Harry just grinned and nodded in the direction of the insult. “Fair point. Guess I’m an anomaly.”

“In more ways than one,” Seaton said. “Here we were thinking you’d been neutralized for most of that little skirmish last year, and all along you were just keeping your mouth shut. It’s quite impressive that you survived a battle against our greatest son.”

There was an intake of breath. The common room was noticeably emptier than the previous night but word of _this_ episode would spread before lunch. Harry grinned again, but it had been warm before, and now it wasn’t. “Funny, I don’t remember fighting Merlin anytime lately.”

Seaton sneered. “Merlin was Sorted as an honor; he was a grown wizard past his prime by the time Hogwarts began. So much for Slytherin loyalty, if you stood up to the truest member of our House we’ve seen in centuries.”

“If you’ll recall, my brother fought him directly, and survived,” Harry drawled. “Again. I’m sure he’ll appreciate the compliment you just paid him. I just… kept us alive. And got us out of there.” He smiled, with teeth.

Seaton smiled back. Harry knew that look; he was readying the knife. “And you didn’t say a word about it, did you? Even to defend yourself from the Order when they made you out to be the helpless, unstable spare. Poor little Harry, the fight was so _stressful_ , gave you some flashbacks, maybe some tears when you tried to tell anyone what _really_ happened… Muggles really did a number on you, hm? Left some damage in their wake?”

For a brief second, Harry was so angry he couldn’t feel his hands.

For a brief second, he imagined casting a torture curse.

For a brief second, he was a toddler wracked with nausea and crawling back to his cupboard because he was too disoriented to stay upright, thanks to a cast-iron frying pan hitting him in the head. Deliberately.

“Oh, Seaton,” he said instead, feigning pity. Slytherin valued words, not hexes, for all those flew every other day. Injuries healed. Humiliation, verbal defeat—that didn’t. “Everyone’s seen the trial records by now; that I’m _damaged_ is no secret. Apparently you’re just too blind to realize that _damage_ didn’t leave me crying in the corner, it just helped me leave a corpse on the ground.”

Seaton actually stepped back half a step. Someone took a sharp breath behind Harry.

He glanced over his shoulder and his stomach did something unpleasant. It took all his self-control to not flinch when he saw _Crabbe_ standing there. Of _all_ people. Goyle behind him, but that hardly mattered; Crabbe was staring at Harry.

Shit.

“Hey, sorry,” Harry said easily, stepping out of the way.

Seaton wore his shock uncensored for a second. He almost definitely knew the truth of what happened in the graveyard. Harry nodded cordially to the boy whose father he’d murdered and waited for him to pass without comment. Relaxed. Confident. Looking for all the common room to see as though he didn’t give a shit he was talking to a classmate whose father he had murdered.

Really put Ronald’s idiotic dislike into perspective, actually.

“…right,” Goyle grunted, following Crabbe across the common room. Eyes tracked them, calculating and cool.

“Lucky strike?” Seaton suggested. He was smiling now, though, and his tone had turned light. Challenge rescinded.

Harry matched him, and let tension bleed out of his posture. Mostly. “Well, given I was holding off about ten Death Eaters, and that I only lasted about fifteen seconds? Probably.”

That got a bigger smile and a measuring look from Seaton, laughs from around the common room, and an end to the problem _there_.

Over breakfast, Jules received piles of mail, more than a little attention, and another week of detention with Umbridge. Harry sighed as fifty points drained from the Gryffindor hourglass. It was good for Slytherin, of course, but _honestly_ , Jules needed to be more _careful_.

He found his brother lazing about in the common leisure rooms instead of doing homework like everyone _else_ did on Sundays.

“Harry?” Jules said. They didn’t generally seek each other out in public like this. Ronald geared up for a fight behind him, though Patil didn’t do any more than look wary. Lucky the room was otherwise empty. 

“Relax, I’m not here to hex you,” Harry said tersely. He pulled two bottles out of an expanded pocket. “Blue potion’s a generic healing potion. The clearish thing is essence of murtlap. Have two standard medical measures of the healing potion after each of your detentions, and then soak your hand in the murtlap.”

Jules didn’t take the bottles. “How d’you know?”

“You think you’re the only one she’s targeted?” Harry said, rolling his eyes. “Slytherin has its undesirables too, brother dear, and as you may have noticed, Umbridge isn’t fond of Muggle-borns.”

“…thanks.” Jules took the bottles and jammed them both into his horrifically disorganized book bag.

Harry caught at Jules’ hand before he could flinch away. _“I must not tell lies_ ,” he read.

Jules wrenched his wrist out of Harry’s grasp. “Happy now?”

“Not particularly,” Harry said. “If you run out of potion, or if any of the Gryffindors need more, find me.”

“I could brew it,” Patil said suddenly.

Harry remembered the conversation the twins had reported to him. “You’ve been competent in Potions,” he said. “What’s your grade?”

“High E average,” Patil said snippily.

“Okay. One second,” Harry said, conjuring parchment, quill, and inkwell. The inkwell floated next to him and he braced the parchment on the wall. He was careful to disguise his handwriting as he worked.

“Here.” He handed her a scroll. “That’s the healing potion recipe. It’s modified a bit, so if you look it up, the steps won’t be quite the same.”

“Thanks.” Patil tried to take the scroll, but Harry didn’t let go. She narrowed her eyes at him.

“Intellectual property rights,” he said softly. “These are _my_ modifications. Study them all you like but this recipe doesn’t go past your little defense club’s assistant brewers, and it’s my patent. If anyone asks, you found it slipped in your bag one day.”

Only when she nodded did he let go.

“Thanks, Harry,” Jules said.

Ronald glared suspiciously but kept his mouth shut, thank Circe.

“You owe me.” Harry was already walking away.

 _“Slytherins,”_ Ronald said in disgust. This time, Harry let it slide.

Umbridge’s response showed up Monday morning.

  * — — BY ORDER OF — — —



**_THE HIGH INQUISITOR OF HOGWARTS_ **

_Any student found in possession of a sound crystal  
linked to the Wizarding Wireless program Rhyme & Reason  
will be expelled. _

_The above is in accordance with Educational  
Decree Number Twenty-Seven. _

_Signed:_

_Dolores Jane Umbridge_

_High Inquisitor_

“Stupid,” Pansy sighed, eyeing the entrance hall notice board with distaste. “Everyone’s going to get their hands on a recording now.”

“No one accused the hag of being brilliant,” Draco said, offering her his arm with a smirk and a flourish. “Breakfast, my queen?”

Pansy whacked him with a rolled-up copy of the Daily Prophet. “I’m not _your_ anything, Malfoy, we broke it off.”

Harry and Theo snickered.

“And _you two_ can shut it,” she snarled, turning her glare on them.

They schooled their expressions in unison. “Whatever do you mean, Pansy dear?” Theo simpered.

“I hate all of you. Someone get me coffee,” she muttered.

“Right this way, my lady,” Harry said solemnly, and dodged her swat as they moved into the Great Hall.

Her prediction turned out correct. By the end of the day, though not a single sound crystal was seen, the entire student body was buzzing about Jules’ interview. Daphne and Hermione even reported that girls were discussing it in the bathroom when they stopped before heading to Runes.

Gryffindor’s lost points were made up by Tuesday evening. Blaise sighed at the hourglass and Slytherin kept up a general underground grumble of complaint about favoritism all through dinner.

Melvin ended up in the hospital wing that Thursday with half his bones crushed to gravel and several internal organs ruptured. His broom had suffered a catastrophic failure of its enchantments in the middle of a pickup game of Quidditch and dumped him onto the pitch from seventy feet up. Pomfrey transferred him to St. Mungo’s, where the healers would be vanishing and regrowing his bones and doing multiple organ transplants.

“Interesting book?” Harry asked Daphne, seeing a title that had to do with brooms and cursing in her bag that evening.

She exchanged a conspiratorial smirk with Theo. “Yes, Theo and Hermione and I found it fascinating. And… relevant.”

“Such a pity about Melvin,” Blaise said, glancing over Harry’s shoulder and speaking a touch louder than absolutely necessary. Harry looked in the reflection of the dark windows out into the Black Lake; that was Seaton looking back at them. Ha.

“Pity indeed.” He hummed a bit and pulled out the Disillusionment Charm work. He was _so close_ to reconstructing the charm’s base and then he could _finally_ add it to his repertoire. Stupid Ravenclaw theory-before-practice approach. “He should know better than to trust so blindly. In his broom, obviously.”

He definitely hadn’t meant the broom. His friends all smirked knowingly. Seaton didn’t but when Harry glanced over his shoulder a second later, the older boy’s expression said all he needed to know.

Harry still had to deal with petty squabbles. Several sixth and seventh years took it upon themselves to test him over the next week, but never quite at Seaton’s level. The first and second year Vipers got into a number of spats with their year-mates who made sneering comments about Harry, until he took to glaring at the perpetrators whenever he saw them. They stopped fairly quickly.

Hufflepuff thrashed Gryffindor. Jules, Ronald, Fred, and George didn’t even go to the match. One of the replacement Beaters hit Angelina Johnson in the face with his bat; the other fell off his broom when Zacharias Smith zoomed at him. A seventh year named something like Towers or Towler had taken over as Seeker, but he seemed to have no idea what he was doing. It was a miracle they only lost by seventy points.

The twins hung Smith upside down by the ankles in the entrance hall the next morning, and the rest of Hufflepuff, halfway through breakfast, found themselves unable to speak in anything other than Mermish. For three days, the castle was full of ungodly shrieking from a quarter of the student body. Harry double-checked but George and Fred had covered their tracks well.

_Pansy_

“Mr. Malfoy, Miss Parkinson. Stay after class.”

Pansy smiled sweetly at Professor McGonagall, hiding her distaste with practiced ease. “Yes, Professor.”

Draco just nodded in the patented Malfoy I’m-doing-you-a-favor-by-existing style. McGonagall’s nostrils flared slightly but she said nothing, spun on her heel, and stalked over to rip into poor Millicent’s shoddy wandwork. Transfiguration was not the other girl’s strong point, although she had a dab hand at Charms.

“What d’you think she wants?” Draco hissed.

“Well, my first thought was to compliment our hairstyles, but if that were the case she wouldn’t have held _you_ back,” Pansy said.

Draco drew himself up, offended. “Excuse me?” 

“You’re excused,” Pansy said kindly, and promptly turned her back on him. Honestly, she should’ve known better than to sit next to him in class, but they tended to shift seats and today this was how it worked out.

Harry leaned around Neville and caught her eye. _You good?_ he mouthed. 

Pansy shot him a withering glare.

Harry raised his hands and sat back, returning to his conversation with Neville.

Pansy and Draco packed their things with the rest of the class, but they approached McGonagall’s desk rather than file out with the rest of the class. The strict Head of Gryffindor steepled her fingers under her chin and eyed the Slytherin prefects. Pansy kept a polite expression fixed on her face with some effort. Morgana, but she hated this woman. McGonagall thought herself a paragon of _fairness_ and _justice_ and _morality_ but she was mostly just what Hermione might have grown up to be without interference. Rigid, holier-than-thou, thinking herself open-minded when really she was the opposite, unwaveringly convinced of her own righteousness.

“I’m sure you’re both aware of why I am speaking with you.”

“Not really, no,” Draco drawled.

Again with the little nostril-flare of irritation. “Miss Parkinson?”

“I’m afraid the reason quite escapes me as well, Professor,” she said, and called up a faint blush.

McGonagall’s lips thinned. “Allow me to explain, then. There has been a rather… unprecedented number of students ending up in the hospital wing of late, and of typically talented children turning in remarkably poor work.”

“Perhaps everyone’s just a bit… put off by the Azkaban breakout,” Pansy suggested innocently. “I imagine that would put all of us on edge, and distract even the most high-performing students.” _Including Libby Borage, those Gryffindor third years, Sophie Roper, Ravenclaw sixth year Timmy Nguyen, and… who else was it this week? Oh yeah, Ben Creed. Again. Fucker just won’t learn._

“I might be inclined to agree, Miss Parkinson, were it not for the fact that none of these students come from Slytherin House.”

Below McGonagall’s sight line, Draco’s right hand started twitching. Pansy controlled her anger. “Your point, Professor?”

“Two points from Slytherin for your cheek, Mr. Malfoy,” McGonagall said. Pansy trod on Draco’s foot, disguising the motion as a slight shift of weight. “As Slytherin prefects, it falls to you to curb this disturbing trend. Which is why I bring it to your attention.”

Well, it was a decent attempt at Slytherin-esque wordplay, for a Gryffindor.

“I’m not sure what this has to do with Slytherin,” Pansy said.

Draco sneered. “We certainly aren’t responsible for the other Houses’ accidents.”

Impossibly, McGonagall’s lips got even thinner. “You claim this has nothing at all to do with Slytherin?”

Pansy chose her words carefully. “Slytherins don’t tend to lash out without provocation. And as you said, there have been no Slytherins in the hospital wing.”

“Except Shawna Rayburn and Katherine Chapman,” Draco said in a bored tone. “They’re interning with Pomfrey, remember?”

“Oh, that’s right.” Pansy smiled at McGonagall. Her teeth hurt. “I imagine they might fix any internal healing issues if they had to.” Like when three Gryffindors got Celesta from behind and left her to hobble down to the common room on goats’ legs, or unidentified parties hung Aria Cross and Alex Rowle in the trees by their ankles under Petrificus Totalus, or when some of the Hufflepuff third years pushed Dylan Worple and Vasily Sitch off a moving staircase. Vasily had hauled Dylan down to the dungeons and gotten Harry and Hestia involved, and Chapman had unhappily healed the Hufflepuff’s broken arm after she handled Vasily’s four cracked ribs and bruised kidney.

“It would be highly improper for apprentice Healers to attend to student injuries without supervision,” McGonagall said stiffly.

Pansy smiled again, with teeth. “I said _might_ fix. It was hypothetical.”

“I see.” McGonagall leaned back and studied them. Pansy and Draco stared back, not giving an inch. Pansy would always see the vain, petulant child in Draco, having grown up with him, but she had to give him credit for becoming a reasonably competent Slytherin. And any reasonably competent Slytherin could outwait a Gryffindor any day of the week.

Sure enough, McGonagall was the first to give. “You understand that magic is not to be used in the corridors under any circumstances.”

“Except in self-defense,” Pansy said without missing a beat. _Also revenge._

“There should be no circumstances in which magical self-defense becomes necessary. Hogwarts is perfectly safe.”

“Of course.” Draco made a show of looking at his heavy silver wristwatch. “Professor, I’m afraid we may be late to Charms if we linger too much longer.”

“You may go.”

Her eyes burned into Pansy’s shoulder blades on the way out.

“Hogwarts is perfectly safe,” Draco mimicked as soon as the door shut. “How fucking naïve can she _get?”_

Pansy rolled her eyes. “And ‘It would be highly inappropriate for an apprentice Healer to take care of students on their own.’ I’m not entirely sure what she was expecting us to say to that, confess?”

“Fucking lions,” Draco snarled.

“Most of them.”

“Can’t believe Harry found the _only_ decent Gryffindors in our year that early,” Draco muttered.

Pansy smirked. “He recognizes talent.”

Draco tried to swat her. Pansy dodged easily. “C’mon, Drake, you’ve been using that move since we were _four_.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“What? Drake?” She smiled evilly. “I could use Dray-dray instead… Hm, I bet Daphne and Theo would find those nicknames _very_ entertaining.”

Draco paled. It was an open secret that Theo and Daphne only tolerated him because of Harry. “Don’t you _dare_ …”

“Or what?” she said, twirling a bit of hair around her finger.

“I’ll think of something.”

“Yes, you will,” Pansy said contentedly. “I’ll think of something else first.”

“Bloody menace,” Draco mumbled, falling in step with her again. The corridors were empty and they were probably going to be late to Charms, but Flitwick was one of the least biased of the other professors. Pansy could probably talk them out of it. “I can’t believe our parents almost cradle betrothed us.”

“Good thing there was no contract,” Pansy agreed.

He propped an elbow on her shoulder as they walked. “Who’ve you got your eye on then, if not me?”

“Weasley.”

Draco choked. “Not funny!”

“It was, a little,” she said. “How about you? How’s courting Granger coming?”

“What?”

Pansy leveled an unimpressed glare on him. “You need to control that reaction, Draco dear. Your face is _bright_ red. Did you really think we hadn’t noticed your little crush?”

“Does she…”

“No idea. Harry can tell. Actually, most of our year-mates in Slytherin have caught on. Not the rest.”

Draco’s eyes darted around the empty hall. “I… she can’t know.”

“I won’t say a word.” Pansy eyed him sideways. “Daphne might mention her… suspicions, if she has any.” She had plenty of suspicions. She and Pansy had discussed this, at length. Draco didn’t need to know that, just as Daphne wouldn’t hear confirmation of said suspicions from Pansy, who knew how to keep secrets.

On the one hand, she considered Draco a friend now that they were older and he was tolerable. On the other, this was _excellent_ blackmail material. Far too useful to waste for the sake of a bit of girly gossip time. No, Pansy would be keeping it in reserve.

Draco nodded, jaw tight.

“Your parents?”

“Mother’s always been more… flexible in her thinking,” Draco muttered. “Ability over blood and all that. Father…”

Enough said. Fixed worldviews were the prerogative of Gryffindors and sanctimonious Hufflepuffs, or Slytherins like Lucius Malfoy whose families had enough wealth and influence to excuse a certain degree of mental rigidity. Narcissa, on the other hand, had come from the auxiliary branch of the Blacks, which had to rely more on cunning than money.

“Mother would talk him around. Eventually,” Draco said. “But she’s seeing Theo anyway.”

 _For now_. Pansy didn’t say it, but round table discussions in the Knights Room with Hermione, Daphne, and occasionally Iris had given Hermione doubts about her sort-of-relationship’s future.

“This time last year, you were seeing me,” she said instead. “Kind of.”

Draco made an unimpressed noise, but they’d arrived at Charms and had to cut the conversation short.

Harry caught Pansy’s eye when she walked in. She made her explanations to Flitwick, slid into the empty seat between Harry and Blaise, and caught them up on McGonagall’s interlude.


	5. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is now chapter 19 of the original work. I've also inserted the previously missing Chapter 15 at the beginning of this work, as someone pointed out that one of the chapters in the original was a PSA. Apologies for the confusion.

_Harry_

Eriss stopped dead in the middle of the dungeon corridor. Theo almost stepped on her, and danced back from the irate hiss she sent his way. Only Harry understood it, which was good, because _Merlin_ she said some nasty things.

 _“What is it?”_ he asked instead. Several other Slytherins from outside the Vipers looked askance at the sound of Parseltongue even though they’d gradually gotten used to Harry openly carrying his familiar around the common room.

Eriss lifted her head. _“I’m not sure. Someone’s screaming. Back where we came from.”_

_“The entrance hall?”_

_“Somewhere around there.”_

Harry sighed. They’d _just_ finished dinner and left early as a group, as Slytherin had taken to doing as protection against ambushes. To investigate or not…

“What?” Theo said.

“She hears screaming.”

“Let’s go see,” Graham said excitedly, turning around with Veronica, Malcolm, and Liam at his shoulders.

Well, that settled that. Harry wasn’t about to let them book it without protection. The rest of the Slytherin fifth years followed him, some more willingly than others, and then Hestia and Flora and Adrian, and the next thing he knew about twenty Slytherins were heading back up to investigate.

They were halfway back to the entrance hall when Jules hurtled out of a side corridor and ran smack into Daphne.

The blonde girl had him pinned to the wall with her wand at his throat in half a second. “Potter?” she snapped.

“Get off me,” Jules growled, his own wand digging into her ribs.

Huh. His dueling lessons had been paying off, then. “Enough,” Harry said, and Daphne stepped back, although she didn’t put her wand away. Jules looked disheveled and stressed, anger pounding worryingly close to the surface.

“I heard a scream,” Jules said.

“Yeah, so did we.” In Harry’s peripheral vision, he noted Blaise subtly scooping Eriss into his book bag. “Coming?”

Jules looked over the group of Slytherins, who stared back with blank faces and impenetrable hostility. “…sure.”

They started walking.

Theo broke the silence. “So what are you doing down here in snake territory?”

“Remedial Potions,” Jules said tersely.

Badly disguised snickers reached their ears. Jules flushed a dull, ugly red.

Theo opened his mouth again, but Harry caught his eye and Theo shut it again with a scowl.

They flooded into the entrance hall less than two minutes later, and found it already packed with hordes of students who had been finishing dinner. In the middle of the hall was Professor Trelawney, clutching a sherry bottle in one hand and her wand in the other, looking very mad. Her glasses were lopsided and her hair wild and her innumerable shawls and scarves askew.

Snape was ahead of them, stepping up to stand with McGonagall, who looked faintly sick.

With a _bang_ , two trunks flung down the stairs and bounced. One landed upside-down next to Trelawney, who stared in the direction they’d come from in terror.

“No!” she shrieked. “NO! This cannot be happening… It cannot… I refuse to accept it!”

“You didn’t realize this was coming?” said a high girlish voice, sounding callously amused, and Harry, moving slightly to his right, saw that Trelawney’s terrifying vision was Umbridge. At his side, Jules glared in the hag’s direction. “Incapable though you are of predicting even tomorrow’s weather, you must surely have realized that your pitiful performance during my inspections, and lack of any improvement, would make it inevitable you would be sacked?”

“Can’t fucking believe that _thing_ was a Slytherin,” Hestia sighed.

“You c-can’t! Trelawney howled, tears streaming down her face, “you c-can’t sack me! I’ve b-been here sixteen years! H-Hogwarts is m-my h-home!”

“Creepy bat,” Daphne sniffed. Jules whipped around to glare at her. “What? She _is_.”

“It _was_ your home,” said Umbridge, enjoyment stretching her squashed face. Trelawney sank, sobbing, onto one of her trunks. “Until an hour ago, when the Minister of Magic countersigned the order for your dismissal. Now kindly remove yourself from this hall. You embarrass all of wizardkind.”

But she stood and watched, with an expression of gloating enjoyment, as Trelawney shuddered and moaned, rocking on her trunk. Pansy elbowed Harry and nodded in the direction of Brown and Patil, who were both crying silently and appeared to be holding each other upright. He sneered involuntarily at such a disgustingly public show of emotion.

“Four galleons she has some kind of fainting fit,” Everett said maliciously.

Chapman snorted. “Five it involves some kind of wailing.”

“You prat, she’s already _doing_ that…”

“Ten galleons Dumbledore interferes somehow,” Seaton said.

“He can’t, his hands are tied, I’ll take _that_ bet.”

Money changed hands and quiet bets were placed. Jules stared at them in horror. 

Mercifully, McGonagall broke away from the other spectators and marched forward, distracthing him. She conjured a large handkerchief and handed it to Trelawney. “There, there, Sybill… Calm down… Blow your nose… It’s not as bad as you think, now… You are not going to have to leave Hogwarts.”

“Oh, really, Professor McGonagall?” said Umbridge, in what she probably thought was a frightening voice. “And your authority for that statement is…?”

The oak front doors slammed open. “That would be mine.”

Students near the doors scuttled out of the way as Dumbledore appeared in the entrance. Several Slytherins who’d bet against Seaton groaned quietly. He cut an impressive figure backlit against the misty night, with a terrible expression and royal purple robes. The doors hung open behind him as he strode forward to Trelawney and McGonagall.

“Yours, Professor Dumbledore?” said Umbridge with an unpleasant little laugh. “I’m afraid you do not understand the position. I have here an Order of Dismissal signed by myself and the Minister of Magic. Under the terms of Educational Decree Number Twenty-Three, the High Inquisitor of Hogwarts has the power to inspect, place upon probation, and sack any teacher she—that is to say, I—feel is not performing up to the standard required by the Ministry of Magic. I have decided that Sybill Trelawney is not up to scratch. I have dismissed her.”

Dumbledore merely smiled. He looked down at the woman sobbing on her trunk and said, “You are quite right, Professor Umbridge. You have every right to dismiss my teachers. You do not, however, have the authority to send them away from the castle. I am afraid that the power to do that still resides with the headmaster, and it is my wish that Professor Trelawney continue to live at Hogwarts.”

Trelawney laughed wildly. “No—no, I’ll g-go, Dumbledore! I sh-shall leave Hogwarts and s-seek my fortune elsewhere…”

“No,” said Dumbledore sharply, “it is my wish that you remain, Sybill.”

“And what Dumbledore wishes, the rest of the world bends over backwards to give him,” someone muttered sardonically, to the amusement of the entire clot of Slytherins. Jules frowned. Harry watched him for a few seconds. It was more of a pensive expression than an offended one. Interesting change.

“Might I ask you to escort Sybill back upstairs, Professor McGonagall?”

“Of course,” said McGonagall. “Up you get, Sybill…”

Sprout hurried forward and grabbed Trelawney’s other arm. The two witches guided her pas Umbridge and up the marble stairs. Flitwick waved his wand, squeaked _“Locomotor trunks_ ,” and followed, guiding Trelawney’s luggage obediently up the stairs.

Umbridge stood stock-still. “And what,” she said in a whisper that carried through the otherwise dead silent hall, “are you going to do with her once I appoint a new Divination teacher who needs her lodgings?”

“Oh, that won’t be a problem,” said Dumbledore pleasantly. “you see, I have already found a new Divination teacher, and he will prefer lodgings on the ground floor.”

“You’ve found—?” Umbridge said shrilly. Harry shoved his hands in his pockets and grinned. This was great comedy. “ _You’ve_ found? Might I remind you, Dumbledore, that under Educational Decree Twenty-two—”

“—the Ministry has the right to appoint a suitable candidate if—and only if—the headmaster is unable to find one,” Dumbledore cut in smoothly. “And I am happy to say that on this occasion I have succeeded. May I introduce you?”

He turned to face the open front doors, which had allowed some of the mist to creep into the hall. It was an altogether eerie effect. Hoofbeats sounded on the stone steps leading up to the front doors. Harry’s eyes narrowed as he flashed back to one of Hannah’s many impassioned lectures on magical creatures.

Several people tripped in their haste to get farther from the doors.

The mist parted and a strangely shaped figure appeared. He stepped forward, out of the fog. White-blond hair and astonishingly blue eyes, the head and torso of a man joined to the palomino body of a horse.

A _centaur_.

“This is Firenze,” said Dumbledore happily to a thunderstruck Umbridge. “I think you’ll find him suitable.”

Umbridge’s mouth gaped open but no sound came out. “A—a _half-breed!”_

“She’s the one that forced that anti-werewolf legislation through,” someone hissed from the knot of Slytherins. Jules twitched, although his anger was directed at Umbridge this time.

Hm. Her hatred of half-breeds was more than academic, then. Umbridge was clutching her wand and glaring at Firenze as though she were half a heartbeat away from setting him on fire.

“You could say that,” Firenze said mildly. “Although centaurs tend to find that descriptor rather… demeaning.”

“It’s not _qualified_ to teach _students!”_ Umbridge shrieked.

“To the contrary.” Firenze’s demeanor didn’t change in the slightest. “My people are quite skilled in the art you call divination, although our methods differ somewhat from those of human magicals.”

“Your quarters are just down there,” Dumbledore said to Firenze with a warm smile. “Argus, if you could show him the way?”

Leering unpleasantly the whole time, Filch elbowed his way out of the crowd. “This way,” he snarled, and lurched off down the first floor corridor.

Firenze bowed to the student body as a whole and followed. People leaped out of his way.

Umbridge stowed her wand with shaking hands. Harry caught the twins’ eyes across the hall and knew they were filing away her fear for future reference. Really, this had been a clever move on Dumbledore’s part. Umbridge would be unstable, though; the “undesirable” students would have to be extra careful for a bit. 

“Good evening, Professor Umbridge,” Dumbledore said happily, flicking his wand to shut the doors and striding away up the staircase.

The entrance hall erupted into busy chatter. Umbridge snarled and shoved her way back into the Great Hall.

“Pay up,” Seaton said gleefully.

Harry slipped off after Jules in the cover of money changing hands. _“What?”_ Jules snapped when Harry caught his elbow.

“Calm down,” Harry said.

“Sorry.” Jules visibly forced himself to relax. “What is it?”

“Spread the word to be careful for the next few days,” Harry said. “Umbridge will be looking for excuses to take this out on people.”

“Fuck, good point.” Jules ran a hand through his hair. “Dumbledore will protect the students.”

“Can he?”

Jules made a face. “I’ll spread the word.”

The student body was on fire with rumors about Firenze over the next few days. After hearing about the Divination lessons from a few Slytherins who’s wanted the easy O, Harry had never been more glad that he’d opted for Runes and Arithmancy instead.

“Have you met him?” Barty asked, referring to Firenze, at their next session.

Harry cocked an eyebrow. “You’re perfectly aware I wouldn’t touch the Divination classes here with a ten-foot pole.”

“Don’t be a smart-ass.”

“I’d rather be a smart-ass than a dumbass.”

Barty snickered. “You’d have fit in well in my House.”

Harry raised his other eyebrow.

“Mm, yes, I’m well aware you would have had every one of them dancing to your tune by this point. The centaur. Have you met him?”

“Not in person. He doesn’t eat with us at meals—something about the smell of human food bothering him.”

Barty nodded. “Centaurs don’t associate with humans much, and they tend to have enhanced senses, although that can vary from one herd to another.”

“Is there _any_ subject you don’t know at least a little about?” Harry said irritably.

“One of the only things I was allowed to do, under the Imperius, was read,” Barty said flatly. “Winky felt sorry for me, sometimes, and let me into the books Father implied but never ordered her to keep me away from. So no, not many.”

Harry didn’t bother pretending to feel bad for touching on a sore subject. “Do you want me to meet him?”

“I’m just interested,” Barty said, curiosity animating his entire face. It was the kind of curiosity that Harry imagined had first led humans to dissect other humans’ dead bodies. “Witches and wizards using divination is spotty at best—it really can’t be taught. You have the gift or you don’t, which is the main reason having it on the curriculum here is one of the most ridiculous things about Hogwarts’ many, many failings as an educational institution. Centaurs, though—they have different magic, like house-elves or goblins have different magic, and divination is _completely_ different for them than for us. I’d be fascinated to speak with one… Usually they avoid our kind…”

“I’d be happy to introduce you, but, you know.” Harry gestured vaguely towards Barty’s left arm. “Death Eater and all.” He could think of several ways to get around that, all of which involved Polyjuice, identity theft, and Occlumency, but he wasn’t going to suggest any.

“Hm.” Barty frowned. “I’ll think on it.

Concerning. He’d probably come up with a way to talk to Firenze on his own, if Riddle allowed it.

“Anyway. If you get the chance, ask him how centaurs’ divination differs from ours, although you may not understand the answer, as you’ve never taken the class.”

Harry shrugged. He preferred to make his own future, thank you very much. He’d read _Macbeth_. Prophecies never ended well for anyone. Including the one over which the Order and the Death Eaters were currently sparring.

Barty rolled his eyes. “Slytherins… Did you finish the Disillusionment Charm work yet?”

“I did, actually,” Harry said, grinning as he whipped out a fat scroll. He’d carefully copied his scattered, messy notes into a cohesive thread of work for presentation. Barty accepted it and read through.

“Good work. You’re finally ready to learn the charm. Wand out. This one is very useful, but done wrong, you might forever end up transparent,” Barty warned. “One wizard used glass as his visualization exercise and turned himself into a glass figurine.”

Harry winced.

“Yes. So, pay attention, and don’t fuck up.”

“Great pep talk,” Harry said, flicking his wand into his hand. “So motivational.”

Barty bowed in his seat, and he was almost as good as Blaise at making nonverbal gestures sarcastic. “I try. Now, do as I do, and I know you’re an excellent Occlumens for your age, so put that mental discipline to good use. _Intent_.”

February blurred into March. The approaching OWL exams loomed unpleasantly large on the horizon for most of fifth year. Justin reported, with copious eye-rolls, that Ernie Macmillan had already descended into obsessive reviewing. Hermione tried, showing up in the Chamber with a six-inch-tall stack of meticulous schedules and study programs, but Theo snatched them away, set them on fire, and told her very bluntly not to work herself into madness.

The Slytherins, as usual, were in pretty good form. Copies of past exams could be had, for the price of a favor or a few galleons. The Vipers in particular were doing well. Everett, Flora, and Celesta arranged for the last ten years’ OWLs to “show up” in the Chamber with terrifying speed.

According to Hermione, most of the Gryffindors were desperately trying to ignore the oncoming exams. Harry reviewed for a few hours each week but, frankly, he wasn’t that worried.

All the Vipers and, surprisingly, the DA members were doing much better in class, though Neville, Hermione, and the twins reported that their sessions were chaotic and rather limited in scope. The Vipers worked on all subjects and their unofficial meetings were usually study groups during which they talked about their plans. So far, Umbridge hadn’t managed to get anyone with Veritaserum, and the Slytherin Muggle-borns were constantly surrounded by their House mates and under strict instructions to be model students in class. There wasn’t much Harry could do for those outside his House but a few quiet conversations with Patil—one of the only tolerable Gryffindors in Jules’ little circle—made sure they’d at least get dittany, essence of murtlap, and his modified healing potion.

“Why are you helping us?” she asked him, once.

Because Ron wasn’t there, Harry answered. “I don’t like you lot much,” he said bluntly. “But Hogwarts is the first place I ever felt at home, and Umbridge is disrupting that. I’m quite happy to undermine her at every opportunity. Including protecting the students of Hogwarts from her.”

“Lots of us haven’t been very nice to you.”

Harry snorted. “I’m surprised any of you has the self-awareness to acknowledge that. Don’t look so offended, you know it’s true. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but so far she hasn’t targeted anyone who’s been an active twat to me, so.”

Patil had nodded and taken the vials of potion he handed over, which held an even better and more recent modified healing potion geared towards blood quills. He wasn’t willing to share the recipe, so between him and Neville and Hermione, they just kept her supplied.

It was a strange truce, but a useful one.

Fred and George pulled at least one major prank per week. They toed the line Harry had set, covering their tracks and not causing any lasting damage to anyone who didn’t deserve it. Harry frequently passed them the names the Slytherin prefects collected of Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and Ravenclaws who were particularly awful, or Slytherins who insisted on clinging to blood supremacy. It was a good way for the twins to blow off steam and indulge their crueler ideas.

He set the Vipers to learning Patronuses the same week the DA did.

“There’s no way we can learn to cast those,” Malcolm objected. “We’re only second years!”

 _“Expecto patronum,”_ Harry said, and his wolf sprang from the tip of his wand, padding over to the young Vipers and sniffing at them. Graham raised a hand toward it in awe.

“I learned it in my third year,” Harry said.

“Yeah, but that’s _you_ ,” Veronica said.

Harry laughed, but looking around—the others _agreed_ with her. Even the older set. Even Hestia and Flora.

“It’s a mental exercise,” he said. “And it might be out of reach for first and second years whose magic isn’t developed enough yet, but your Occlumency should at least start you down the path. Would anyone rather _not_ learn it?”

Predictably, no hands went up, so Harry nodded and moved on. They were sitting in a clot on the Chamber floor on an assortment of conjured chairs and pillows, and he wasn’t quite standing in front of a class, but everyone’s attention was fixed on him. “Right. Firstly, there’s a mental shortcut called ‘framing’ that I read about in third year. You don’t _actually_ need a happy memory to conjure a Patronus. It helps, and with relentless practice, your magic connects the intent with the outcome and the memory becomes unnecessary. Can anyone take a guess why relying on a happy memory to conjure a Patronus is a stupid idea?”

“Dementors suck away happiness,” Vasily said.

Harry nodded. “Exactly. Framing takes about the same amount of time to learn, and it’s simply easier for people without the mental discipline, but it’s cheating. You can produce a Patronus with framing as early as you can by doing it the right way but it takes a lot more practice to be able to conjure one in the face of dementors sucking out your happy memories. I didn’t have a memory happy enough to power a Patronus, so I didn’t have that option.” He ignored the bevy of shocked and upset expressions that created. “I learned the Patronus basically because I was stubborn and I had the power to pull it off. You’ve all been working on basic passive Occlumency this year, so it’s time to put that to use. The incantation is _expecto patronum_ , and the wand movement is thus.”

He demonstrated. Discordant voices practiced the incantation; wands flicked. Harry and the Carrows, who’d taken it upon themselves to learn the Patronus over the summer, went through the group and corrected the wands and incantations until everyone had it right.

It took until early March before anyone succeeded. A shout of joy echoed through the Chamber and everyone turned to look at a silver bear lumbering through the air.

“Brilliant, Nev!” Harry said, grinning.

“Whoa,” Neville said, staring at the silver animal. “A _bear…”_

“You’re terrifying,” Blaise said.

Hestia and Flora’s Patronuses were both swans, and it was impossible to detect which was which when they both flew around the Chamber. Blaise grinned at the panther that settled itself down at his feet. Theo’s Patronus turned out to be an ashwinder, to the surprise of absolutely no one. Hermione cast an otter, Everett an eagle owl, Daphne a coral snake, and Justin a greyhound. Draco was almost the last of the older set to figure it out, and when he finally cast a peacock, everyone burst into laughter.

Celesta seemed pleased with her pine marten. Noah, Adrian, Peregrine, and Jordan Harper couldn’t seem to get past a non-corporeal silver shield and left it at that, but Mason, Iris, Sam, and Aaron refused to accept failure even though they all took longer than the Slytherins. The four of them kept drilling the spell in their spare time.

Harry found them waiting in the Chamber one evening a few days later, when it was his shift on potions duty. “Check this out,” Sam said proudly.

The four Ravenclaws raised their wands. _“Expecto patronum!”_

Mason’s horse, Sam’s boar, Aaron’s barn owl, and Iris’ heron exploded into the Chamber.

“Impressive,” Harry said. “This will earn extra points on your NEWTs, for sure.”

“I’m aware,” Iris said, watching her heron flutter around with satisfaction.

When Pansy finally cast a fox Patronus that bore a startling resemblance to Astrych, everyone cheered.

Evalyn’s mako shark was three times the girl’s own size. None of the other fourth years managed a corporeal Patronus and only a few of the younger set could create even a shield, but Harry told them it was fine and they’d get it with practice. No one seemed discouraged.

“Some of the DA can handle it too,” Neville said one evening, when just Harry and his close friends were holed up in the Chamber study with firewhiskey and conjured sofas, the desk shoved into the corner. “Ron’s is a terrier.”

“Bigger bark than bite,” Daphne said, swirling her glass. “Sounds about right.”

Neville snorted. “No kidding… They’ve quit trying to pick on me, at least.”

“That’s good.” Harry watched him carefully.

“Mhm.”

“Neville and I work together most of the time,” Hermione said. She was leaning back, curled up between Blaise and Daphne, all three of them tangled together in a chair not really designed for three people. “Or Nev and Anthony, and then I pair up with Sue. Her Patronus is a lizard.”

Blaise snickered and Hermione kicked his ankle.

Harry caught Neville’s eye when Hermione chivvied everyone off to bed, insisting that it was a _school night_ , honestly, they needed _sleep_. Neville lingered until it was just him and Harry in the study.

“Nev…” Harry paused. “I… need to ask you something. About your parents.”

Neville stiffened. “Harry—”

“I wouldn’t if I didn’t have to,” Harry cut in. “Please. I just want to know if—they’ve been examined by a Legilimens.”

“Yeah,” Neville said. “I asked Gran once. She said Dumbledore spent a month in St. Mungo’s after it… happened. He was dead on his feet by the end but he said there was nothing to be done and—he’s one of the best Legilimens living.”

Harry frowned. “Neville—did you pay attention to our lessons on the Cruciatus last year?”

“You mean when a disguised Death Eater demonstrated the curse that drove my parents insane _in front of me?”_ Neville said.

“I’ll take that as a _no._ ” Harry shrugged. “It’s just… Sirius has taken five Crucios in a row during the war. He took some time off, rested up, and the mind healers at St. Mungo’s said he was fine after that. How many curses did your parents take?”

Neville’s hands were white-knuckled. “How would I know?”

“The dementors make us see our worst memories,” Harry said quietly. “I—saw—the Dursleys. Some of—what they did to me.” His eyes closed involuntarily and he kept his Occlumency shields up and the memories at bay. “Jules—heard Voldemort killing our mum.”

“And you’re guessing—I relived—that day.”

Harry nodded.

“You’re not wrong.” Neville frowned. His eyes unfocused a bit. “I… three times. I heard it cast six times, so—three each. But—can we trust—dementor memories?”

Harry let out a bitter laugh. “All mine were real.”

“But… that… Maybe the Lestranges modified the curse.”

“Maybe.” Harry could tell Neville didn’t believe that any more than he did.

“Something’s weird about this,” Neville said, almost to himself. “I’ll write—”

“No,” Harry said quickly. “They’re probably watching the mail, remember? And almost definitely the Floo. Wait until the summer. Just—I wanted—Sirius was talking about some of his war stories last summer and I just—couldn’t help thinking something was wrong. So I brought it up.”

“Thanks for telling me,” Neville said quietly. “You’re… my best friend, Harry, you know that, right?”

“I do.” Harry tried a smile.

“And I wouldn’t make you choose—I know Theo’s yours,” Neville added hurriedly. “Just… thanks. For—seeing me.”

There were a lot of things he could say to that, but Harry didn’t feel like saying any of them, so he just nodded and laid a hand on Neville’s shoulder.

“Don’t curse me,” Neville said, and then he stepped forward and _hugged_ him.

Harry went rigid. _Neville_ , he reminded himself, _Neville_ , his friend who had the sense to keep his grip loose and easy to break out of, so he very hesitantly raised his own arms and wrapped them around Neville’s back in return. It was weird and awkward and _why_ did people find it _comforting_ to wrap their bodies around each other like this—

“See?” Neville said, stepping back with a shaky smile. “You didn’t die.”

“I never think I’m going to _die_ ,” Harry said, a bit stiffly, but Neville’s laugh and his return smile were as genuine as anything.

_Neville_

He sighed at the Room of Requirement in general. “Sometimes I wish we didn’t have to come…”

“Yeah, but it’s useful,” Hermione said happily. “Any chance to practice spellwork is useful.”

“Plus, you know, keeping an eye on the Boy Who Lived to Be Annoying,” George said darkly. He and Fred had taken to lurking around Hermione and Neville during DA meetings and really only interacted with Angelina Johnson and Katie Bell. They got tons of orders for their Skiving Snackboxes and some other early joke products but some of the things Neville had overheard them whispering about involved less benign creations.

All four of them watched Jules pause by Cho Chang, Marietta Edgecombe (fresh out of the hospital wing and target of Fred and George’s periodic glares), Macmillan, Roper, and Bones. He talked for a few minutes and had Chang try the Patronus again.

The DA erupted into cheers when she successfully cast a robin.

“He’s good at teaching,” Neville said. “You have to admit…”

Fred snorted but didn’t deny it.

“Must run in the family,” Hermione agreed.

Jules worked his way through the group. Neville had only gotten his bear to appear at the Vipers meeting last weekend, and this was the first DA session since. He was excited to give it a try.

So when Jules got to the little clot in the corner, which now included Anthony, Sue, Lisa, and Hannah, Neville swallowed the sick nervousness in his stomach. So many years without the magical ease of his peers left him with a constant voice whispering _what if it doesn’t work, what if the last year has been a fluke, what if this time it just doesn’t happen, what if what if what if_ —

Every spell was proving something to himself. Every spell was Neville convincing himself that, no, he _wasn’t_ a Squib, and also reminding himself that he had friends who’d liked him before the cherry and unicorn wand.

He ignored the insulting amount of surprise on everyone’s face that _Neville Longbottom_ had volunteered to go first. Honestly, he was used to it, after four and a half years. Neville focused, ignoring the ‘happy memory’ bullshit like Harry and Hestia and Flora had taught him. _“Expecto patronum!”_

Magic flooded down his arm and through his wand in a heady rush. Neville’s face split into a broad grin as silver light coalesced into a grizzly bear standing on its hind legs and looming over Jules. Several people screamed.

“Holy shit,” Jules said.

Ronald’s eyes were wide as saucers.

“No _way_ ,” someone said, and there were other whispers, too, shocked and incredulous and impressed. Honestly. You’d think, after this whole time kicking their asses in the DA, they’d have gotten used to the fact that Neville was not in fact completely incompetent, but _nooo._

Hermione cast an otter and Fred and George their matching foxes, which turned out not to be foxes at all, according to Hannah, who took one look and started talking about a species of magical fox native to Japan with tails made of fire. Kitsunes, she called them. Fred and George had very pleased expressions when they ended the spell. The kind of _pleased_ that had only appeared lately and never boded well for anyone.

“Fiendfyre twins,” Luna said helpfully, having appeared at Neville’s elbow at some point, and then she cast her own Patronus, which turned out to be a hare. He wondered why she’d sat out at the Vipers meeting.

“I can’t have been practicing outside the DA, can I?” she said reasonably.

Neville jumped a bit. “Did you…”

“No,” Luna said, patting his arm. “You’re just transparent. You do well, for a Gryffindor.”

He smiled grudgingly. The Slytherins said similar things. “How’s Blaise?”

Luna fiddled with her hair. “Oh, we’re not together anymore.”

“What? But—”

“I’m with someone else.”

“Oh. Who?” Neville was over his crush on Luna, but still. She was his friend, and he wanted to make sure if she was seeing someone, they didn’t hurt her. Not that she couldn’t take care of herself, what with her penchant for creative and obscure curses that even impressed Theo, but still.

Luna stared at him for a second. Her blue eyes were wide and vaguely creepy. “It’s a secret.”

“Huh. Okay,” Neville said. “Why?”

“Their family wouldn’t be happy with it.”

And, okay, Neville wasn’t the best with what Harry called verbal tap-dancing, but he definitely noticed the lack of a gender-specific pronoun there. Hermione quite clearly hadn’t. She was still prattling on with Hannah about the properties of kitsunes while Fred and George listened and did that silent communication thing with their eyes. That probably meant Luna was seeing a girl, and that said girl had a family who either disliked Lovegoods or same-sex couples. The Lovegoods didn’t really have enemies, so—a Muggle-born?

He smiled at her. “Okay, I won’t say anything, then.”

“You’re a good friend, Neville Longbottom,” she said solemnly. “I’d tell you if I could.”

“I know, Lu,” he agreed. “Tell them I’m sorry their family wouldn’t approve.”

She giggled a bit. “You could tell them yourself…”

Luna trailed away and plopped down near Edgecombe, who gave her a nasty look and muttered what looked like “Loony Lovegood,” a position Neville didn’t understand, but then again he rarely understood Luna. That last comment told him it was someone he knew.

Neville ran over Luna’s friends in his head, and then their families, and then Vipers and _their_ families, and then Muggle-borns, and he was pretty sure he could take a few good guesses. But he wouldn’t. And he _definitely_ wouldn’t mention this to Pansy. Neville actually liked her (a Parkinson, who’d have thought) but she was the uncontested queen of gossip. He had secrets and he wasn’t going to tell them to her.

Secrets like—fuck, he’d _promised_ himself he would stop fixating on this, but he kept breaking his own promise, because it was _his parents_. Harry’s iron self-control had lapsed into uncomfortable hesitation when he was talking about this. Even _Harry_ was uncomfortable with this subject. For _good fucking reason._

Why in the hell had Neville never questioned this before? In fact, why had _Gran_ never questioned this before?

Actually, he could answer that question. Grief. She hadn’t even started functioning like a normal person until he was… six or so. He dimly remembered the vacant wraith-like shell she’d been when he was very young, how he would crawl onto her lap and whisper about Uncle Algie being mean again and throwing things at him to try and spark some accidental magic, and how she’d stroke his hair and not say anything.

And then, one year, on his seventh birthday actually, she’d come downstairs with makeup and neat hair and green robes with the Selwyn-Longbottom combined crest and that Serbian vulture she’d killed on a hunt balanced on her hat. Algie had sputtered and the house-elves had bowed low to their Mistress and suddenly there was a third person living, as opposed to existing, in Longbottom Manor. He _vividly_ remembered her sitting him down and telling him in her strictest no-nonsense tone that she’d been lost for a while but she was back now, and she was his Gran, and she wasn’t going to let Uncle Algie keep pushing his magic. Gran had not been entirely successful on that last front—hence the bouncing-out-the-window incident—but still.

Grief did funny things to people. Probably she’d quit thinking about it altogether in order to be there for her grandson.

Maybe he could bring it up this summer. Maybe it had been long enough. And until then he wanted to do the research on the Cruciatus Curse and its side effects that he’d never paid attention to last year.

A bookshelf popped into existence against the wall nearest him.

Neville jumped. Looked around. Most of the DA had devolved into practice duels; Jules and Ron and Parvati and Toby were talking animatedly by the fireplace. Hermione and Hannah were talking too, and Luna was knitting near Chang, although Edgecombe was now gone, quite possibly just to unnerve them because she was a bit sneaky like that sometimes. Fred and George were casting their kitsunes over and over again. He reached out to the bookshelf, unnoticed.

It was crowded with books on the Unforgivables and Dark Arts. Most of them looked old, and all of them looked battered.

“Can you only give me books people have left in here?” he whispered.

That weird, eerie feeling of affirmation crept into his brain and back out again. Neville resisted a shudder. That would never not be creepy. He’d have to copy them, then, and bring them back—it felt somehow wrong to remove from the accumulated stuff in this room when he didn’t have to.

Next question. “Can I take them out of the room?”

Yes again.

“Excellent.” He started flicking through the books. They were—wow. Dark. Some _really_ Dark. Not quite like what Harry had found in the Chamber, obviously, but those books were a thousand years old, and the wizarding world was slow to change compared to the Muggle one but there had been a lot of great advancements to magic since Salazar Slytherin assembled his little library. Harry and the Vipers would _love_ some of these.

“Thanks,” he said, because it couldn’t hurt to be polite to an ancient semi-sentient magical room, and started piling the books into his bag. Specifically, into the heavily warded and impossible-for-anyone-else-to-open side pocket of his bag. Daphne had taught him the wards and teased him that warding would never be his specialty because it required a degree of subtlety and finesse he just didn’t have. Neville remembered laughing at the comment, because it was true and honesty was always valuable.

He shook those thoughts away and swept the last book away. The others could use the copybooks to make duplicates, and then he’d bring them back. Although now that he thought about that plan more—

“Do you offer books to people if they’re going to destroy them?”

An almost painfully emphatic sense of _no_ shot through his head. Good. He had a bad feeling that if Jules ever realized things like this existed in the Room of Requirement he would probably do something like ask for all the Dark Arts books and then set them on fire. Ronald would never be clever enough to ask, but Jules might, and Parvati definitely would. Even if Harry seemed to think her beliefs on Light and Dark magic were a little more flexible than her peers’.

He closed the secret compartment and muttered a quick password. It sealed itself and disappeared. No one else would see it. They all had one in their bags and a similarly warded secret pocket, expanded on the inside, in all their school robes, that were used for notes, their journals, and potions in the secret potion-passing network that was slowly being built up in resistance to Umbridge. One of Daphne’s best ideas.

A sudden _crack_ rang through the Room. Neville jumped about six inches, mentally smacked himself in the face, and turned around.

Was that a _house-elf_?

Wait. It was the crazy one that Hermione called a “genetic outlier,” who liked being free. Dippy?

“Dobby?” Jules exclaimed.

Or that.

And why was Dobby _crying?_

“What’s wrong?”

The elf was shaking. Hard. The DA quit practicing, first gradually and then, very suddenly, they were all silent with wands half-held, swapping nervous glances.

Something was wrong. All of Neville’s instincts were screaming. He looked at Hermione and Fred and George and saw that they, too, were alarmed. The twins started inching towards the door.

“Jules Potter, sir,” squeaked the elf. “Jules Potter, sir… Dobby has come to warn you… but the house-elves have been warned not to tell…”

Jules whipped out his Seeker reflexes and snagged the elf’s violently pink jumper before he could throw himself to the floor. One of the elf’s hats fell off. Several girls made sympathetic noises. Hermione just frowned and fingered her wand.

“What’s happened, Dobby?” Jules said urgently.

“Jules Potter… she… she…”

Dobby hit himself in the face with his free hand. Jules grabbed that, too. “Who’s _she_ , Dobby?”

But it was clear that Jules already knew. His face matched the horror Neville already felt.

“Umbridge?” Hermione said briskly.

Dobby nodded, and then tried to hit his face on Jules’ knee. Jules held him at arm’s length, and then picked him up so he had no leverage from which to kick himself. “Has she—she hasn’t—found out about us? About the DA?”

Whimpering, the elf nodded.

“She’s coming,” Jules breathed.

“Yes, Jules Potter, yes!” Dobby howled.

“Winky!” Hermione’s voice rang out.

Her elf appeared with a _crack._ “Yes, Mistress?”

“Take Dobby, don’t let him hurt himself, tell anyone who asks that he was injured in an accident,” Hermione said briskly.

“Yes, Mistress.” Winky grabbed Dobby’s arm and disappeared again.

“What are you waiting for?” Neville bellowed at the assembled students. Stupid sheep. “RUN!”

They all pelted towards the exit at once.

“Bigger door!” Hermione shouted at the ceiling. The Room acquiesced immediately, as the door almost doubled in size; things went a lot faster after that—

“Neville, come on!” Hermione shrieked.

But he had to make sure everyone got out.

Neville collected a couple of third years, Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors who used to make fun of him, and shoved them towards the door, picked up a Ravenclaw seventh year who’d tripped and hauled her in the same direction, made sure Luna was out—she was, sandwiched between the twins, whose hair seemed to be almost alive in the flickering torchlight of the hall—

The room was empty.

Neville and Jules were at the back of the line. They made eye contact for half a second and took off running together for the boys’ bathroom down the hall. It was the kind of uneasy camaraderie formed between two people who didn’t much like each other but shared a common enemy. A bit awkward, but he’d dealt with worse—

“AARGH!”

Jules went down hard. Neville barely managed to dodge the Trip Jinx but then another one caught his ankles and he went down hard.

Or he would have, if a Cushioning Charm hadn’t mysteriously appeared beneath him and stolen his momentum so he only hit the ground from a distance of two inches.

Neville flipped over on his back.

“Got some, Professor!” a familiar voice shouted gleefully.

Draco leered at him and disarmed both Neville and Jules.

Everett, Seaton, and Celesta arrived next, all of them grinning maliciously. Three Vipers, none of them known outside Slytherin as linked to Harry. Clever. Then again, Harry usually was.

Jules was not so fortunate as to earn (or deserve) a Cushioning Charm, and he skidded a good six feet before he came to a halt. Draco paused over Neville, mouthed a very faint and very brief apology, and sauntered on to lord his victory over Jules.

“On your feet, Longbottom,” Celesta sneered. Neville scrambled upright. She ran a thumb over her Vipers ring, a movement that would look unconscious if you couldn’t see the ring, before she poked his chest with her wand.

Umbridge bustled around the corner, breathing hard but wearing a delighted smile. “It’s him!” she said jubilantly. “Excellent, Draco, excellent, oh, very good—fifty points to Slytherin! And Mr. Longbottom, too, thank you, Miss Fawley, I’ll take them from here—”

“Don’t you think someone ought to come along, Professor?” Draco drawled, playing the arrogant pureblood heir to the hilt. “In case they get… ideas. It would be unseemly for a Professor such as yourself to discipline them directly, don’t you think?”

Her stupid mouth stretched, and, okay, she _did_ kind of look like a toad—poor Trevor. “Ahh, an excellent point—I shall bring you along, then, Draco, and Miss Fawley—may I call you Celesta?—you’re welcome to tag along as well… Don’t terrify the Longbottom _too_ badly, I’ve heard he’s quite the little coward, but we can’t all live up to Gryffindor’s _honorable_ legacy…”

Her tinkling laugh drowned out both Neville’s snarl of rage at the dismissal and Celetsa’s quiet “Or, apparently, _Slytherin’s_ legacy, you stupid fat bitch.” It was a sore point among the Vipers and, according to them, the rest of Slytherin that such an unsubtle, obnoxious, rigid-minded, _pink_ witch was technically a Slytherin herself.

“The rest of you, look in the bathrooms—the library—check for anyone out of breath—if anyone finds Miss Parkinson, she can do the ladies’ loos—off you go, now!”

Everett rubbed his ring, too, as he disappeared back the way they’d come with Seaton. Celesta nodded minutely and Neville tried to telegraph understanding with his eyes since he couldn’t risk someone seeing him communicate with one of the Slytherins.

“You two can come with me to the headmaster’s office,” Umbridge said in her softest, deadliest voice.

“Move it, Squib,” Celesta sneered, prodding Neville in the spine with her wand.

He glared over his shoulder. She shrugged, grinning at him. Playing the role. Neville sighed and resigned himself to it.

Draco did not treat Jules gently. Mild Stinging Hexes peppered Jules’ back and shoulders by the time they got to the gargoyle. He couldn’t seem to decide if he should be glaring forwards at Umbridge or backwards at Draco. It was probably only Harry’s protection that kept Draco from using hexes strong enough to leave welts.

Neville glanced back once. _How many?_ he mouthed.

Celesta held up two fingers, and then pointed forward at Neville and Jules. Two that she knew of, then. The other Vipers would know to, at worst, have Aaron—the Head Boy—take points and give detentions. They’d probably play it as the hapless idiots caught up in the flow, while the ringleaders had been dealt with, or some such story, to get as many people as possible off light.

Which left Neville as one of the ringleaders. Awesome.

Then again, Umbridge hated Jules almost as much as she hated Muggle-borns, so he would probably take the brunt of it. Which was only fair, since the DA had been his thing all along. But even as he thought that, Neville knew he’d never be able to just sit there and let Jules take the fall.

“Fizzing Whizbee,” Umbridge sang, and Neville took a moment to think about exactly how much he disliked Professor Dumbledore and his ridiculous obsession with Muggle sweets. Muggles were all well and good as long as their world and the magical one stayed nice and separate. Neville had questioned that worldview once upon a time before he met Harry and started picking up bits about the Dursleys. He’d never got the whole story as a piece, still, but Harry had dropped enough details and offhandedly explained enough of his scars to make it clear: magic scared the shit out of Muggles. Neville didn’t need a few billion of them armed with the weapons Hermione’d told him about suddenly discovering a secret hidden society of magic, thanks very much.

Umbridge hauled them up the stairs and didn’t bother to knock. All four students piled into the office behind her: it was very crowded indeed.

Dumbledore sat behind his desk, face serene and fingers steepled. McGonagall stood rigidly next to him. If she were any tenser, Neville thought she might just shatter. Cornelius Fudge was rocking back and forth on his toes next to the fire, looking every inch the self-satisfied narrow-minded brown-noser Gran described him as. He was attended by Kingsley Shacklebolt and Arnold Dawlish, who Gran had introduced him to at a party once as two of the Auror Corps’ best. Finally, to Neville’s bemusement, Percy Weasley hovered excitedly by the wall, clutching a quill and a heavy scroll like lifelines.

Old portraits of headmasters and headmistresses peered down from the wall, very seriously. They were a constant source of motion as they flitted between the portraits and whispered advice to one another.

Jules stepped away from Draco’s wand as soon as the door shut behind them.

“Well,” Fudge said. “Well, well, well…”

Jules glared at him. Neville resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

“They were heading back to Gryffindor Tower,” said Umbridge, with the same excitement in her voice as had been there when she reduced Trelawney to a miserable disaster. “Mr. Malfoy and Miss Fawley cornered them.”

“Did they, did they?” said Fudge appreciatively. “I must remember to inform Lucius… and Miss Fawley, you’ve a relative on the Wizengamot, if I’m not mistaken?”

“I do, Minister,” Celesta said. She could do ‘sickeningly sweet’ even better than Pansy. “Reaghan Fawley, my mother, holds our family’s ancestral seat.”

“I’ll be putting in a good word with her, too.”

“Professor Umbridge, if I may ask, what are these other students doing here?” Dumbledore said pleasantly.

Umbridge’s mouth stretched even wider. “They came along to ensure there were no… escape attempts, Headmaster.”

“Indeed.” Dumbledore looked Draco and Celesta over. “Might I suggest that we return Mr. Longbottom and Mr. Potter their wands, and dismiss your… assistants? Prefects though they may be, Mr. Malfoy and Miss Fawley’s presence is hardly necessary to the proceedings.”

“I’m not certain returning their wands is such a good idea, Dumbledore,” Fudge said.

Shacklebolt chuckled, a deep and weirdly comforting sound. _Automatic comfort is always suspicious when the source can use magic_ , Harry’s voice said in Neville’s mind, and he narrowed his mind and concentrated on his rudimentary Occlumency shields. Nothing changed, like it had when he practiced throwing off weak compulsion and _confundus_ charms, so Shacklebolt’s effect must be natural.

He’d still be resisting it.

“…two fifteen-year-old boys,” Shacklebolt was saying. “I highly doubt they can do much, even with wands, in a room that includes two Aurors, the Minister of Magic, and three Professors, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Yes, yes…” Fudge jerked his hand. “Go on, give them back, then—Mr. Malfoy, Miss Fawley, thank you for your assistance, you may go.”

“Of course, Minister,” Draco drawled. He handed Jules’ wand back point-first. Both Aurors and McGonagall blanched at the slight. Neville almost flinched when Draco handed _his_ wand back the same way, especially because Draco didn’t drop his mask so much as an inch in this company, but he took it without complaint.

He could always duel Draco later, in a Vipers meeting. Draco was good at dueling and no slouch with magic, but Neville usually beat him.

There was no doubt in Neville’s mind that Gran would lord that over Lucius Malfoy until the end of time should he ever tell her.

Draco and Celesta filed out.

As soon as the door shut, Fudge rounded on the boys. “Well, Mr. Potter, Mr. Longbottom, I expect you know why you are here?”

Unsurprisingly, he was fixed mostly on Jules, along with everyone else in the room. Neville, however, knew whose reactions would be subtlest and most interesting, so _he_ was focused on Dumbledore.

He saw two things of note. One, Dumbledore shook his head a fraction of an inch side to side. And two, he did it while looking at a point just between Jules and Neville.

How odd.

“Y-no,” Jules said.

“I beg your pardon?” said Fudge.

“No,” said Jules, more confidently.

“Neither do I,” Neville said, trying to play up the trembling, magically weak coward everyone thought he was. Gran never let on the digs she received in the Wizengamot but Neville knew she got them and that the Longbottom scion’s magical mediocrity was widely known. His more recent improvement definitely wouldn’t have filtered through the gossip mill to the Minister of Magic yet. And even if it had, he was so mentally rigid he’d probably just brush it off.

After being best friends with Slytherins for years, the Minister was almost pathetically easy to fool. He bought it like a brand-new Firebolt on a seventy-five percent discount. No one else even paid Neville any attention.

Their dismissal rankled, even as he used it.

“So you have no idea,” said Fudge in a voice positively sagging with sarcasm, “why Professor Umbridge has brought you to this office? You are not aware that you have broken any school rules.”

 _I could probably fill Percy’s scroll with an indexed list of every school rule I’ve ever broken. Or turned a blind eye to someone else breaking_. “No,” Neville said.

“School rules?” Jules looked to be thinking something along the same lines. “No.”

“Or Ministry decrees?” amended Fudge angrily.

“Not that I’m aware of,” Jules said very blandly.

Despite his confidence, Neville could see his pulse pounding in his neck and feel the tension coming off him. His blind faith in Dumbledore was a bit disturbing. Then again, Neville was doing the same thing.

Banking off of Dumbledore’s various motivations to keep the Boy Who Lived in Hogwarts was actually a pretty good gamble to take, if he was going to gamble at all.

“So it’s news to you, is it,” said Fudge, his voice now thick with anger, “that an illegal student organization has been discovered within the school?”

“Yes, it is,” Jules said. Neville really hoped that his own ‘innocently surprised’ expression (copied from Pansy and Harry) was more convincing because Jules mostly looked constipated.

“I think, Minister,” said Umbridge silkily, “we might make better progress if I fetch our informant.”

“Yes, yes, do,” said Fudge. “There’s nothing like good evidence, is there, Dumbledore?”

Dumbledore didn’t even react to the jab at his own conviction of malfeasance of office. “Nothing at all, Cornelius,” he said gravely.

They stood around in awkward silence while Umbridge was gone. McGonagall appeared to think that if she moved in the slightest she wouldn’t be able to restrain herself from throwing herself at her students to protect them. Neville had… mixed feelings about her, mainly aimed at her blind faith in authority that was so like the one their group had shaken from Hermione, but still. She was protective and she really tried to be fair. And Gran liked her, which was a pretty exclusive club.

The door slammed open. Neville and Jules both turned to look, and Neville’s eyes widened upon seeing curly-haired Marietta Edgecombe shaking in Umbridge’s grip. Edgecombe, who was… hiding her face in her hands?

Oookay.

He hadn’t expected to find out the results of whatever Hermione cursed the parchment with tonight but he couldn’t deny he was curious.

“Don’t be scared, dear, don’t be frightened,” said Professor Umbridge softly, patting her on the back, “it’s quite all right, now. You have done the right thing. The Minister is very pleased with you. He’ll be telling your mother what a good girl you’ve been. Marietta’s mother, Minister,” she added, looking up at Fudge, “is Madam Edgecombe from the Department of Magical Transportation. Floo Network office—she’s been helping us police the Hogwarts fires, you know.”

Neville stored that away. They’d had their suspicions, hence his own inability to contact Gran on anything serious, but confirmation was nice.

“Jolly good, jolly good!” said Fudge heartily. “Like mother, like daughter, eh? Well, come on, now, dear, look up, don’t be shy, let’s hear what you’ve got to—galloping gargoyles!”

As Edgecombe raised her head, Fudge leaped backward in shock, nearly landing in the fire. Several others gasped. Even Neville was surprised.

Edgecombe wailed and yanked the neck of her robes up to cover her face, but the whole room had already seen it. Her face was horribly disfigured by a series of massive pimples that stretched across her face, spelling the word SNEAK on her forehead and turning her cheeks into shiny red masses of lumps. Her nose and chin had blistered and both lips were irregularly puffy; her left eye had swollen nearly shut. It made poor Eloise Midgen’s notorious acne look like a couple of cute freckles.

“Never mind the spots now, dear,” Umbridge said— _spots?_ Neville thought incredulously— “just take your robes away from your mouth and tell the Minister—”

Edgecombe gave another muffled, wordless wail and shook her head.

“Oh, very well, you silly girl, _I’ll_ tell him,” snapped Umbridge. She hitched her sickly smile back onto her face and said, “Well, Minister, Miss Edgecombe here came to my office shortly after dinner this evening and told me she had something she wanted to tell me. She said that if I proceeded to a secret room on the seventh floor, sometimes known as the Room of Requirement, I would find out something to my advantage. I questioned her a little further and she admitted that there was to be some kind of meeting there. Unfortunately at that point this hex,” she waved impatiently at Marietta’s concealed face, “came into operation and upon catching sight of her face in my mirror the girl became too distressed to tell me any more. Every time she tried, the pustules got worse.”

“Well, now,” said Fudge, fixing Edgecombe with what he probably imagined was a kind and fatherly look. Neville found it patronizing and creepy. “It is very brave of you, dear, coming to tell Professor Umbridge, you did exactly the right thing. Now, will you tell me what happened at this meeting? What was its purpose? Who was there?”

Edgecombe would not speak. She shook her head.

“Haven’t we got a counterjinx for this?” Fudge said impatiently. “So she can speak freely?”

“I have not yet managed to find one,” Umbridge admitted with a scowl. Neville would be complimenting Hermione later, for the jinx’s efficacy and also how absolutely vicious it was. “But it doesn’t matter if she won’t speak, I can take up the story from here.

“You will remember, Minister, that I sent you a report back in October that Potter met a number of fellow students in the Hog’s Head in Hogsmeade, including Longbottom here—”

“And what is your evidence for that?” McGonagall cut in.

“I have testimony from Willy Widdershins, Minerva, who happened to be in the bar at the time. He was heavily bandaged, it is true, but his hearing was quite unimpaired,” said Umbridge smugly. “He heard every word Potter said and hastened straight to the school to report to me—”

“Oh, so _that’s_ why he wasn’t prosecuted for setting up all those regurgitating toilets!” said McGonagall, raising her eyebrows. “What an interesting insight into our justice system.”

_Shouldn’t the man next to you have already tipped you off to the corruption?_

“Blatant corruption!” roared a corpulent portrait. “The Ministry did not cut deals with petty criminals in my day, no sir, they did not!”

“Thank you, Fortescue, that will do,” Dumbledore said softly.

“The purpose of Potter’s meeting with these students,” continued Umbridge, “was to persuade them to join an illegal society, whose aim was to learn spells and curses the Minsitry has decided are inappropriate for school-age—”

“I think you’ll find you’re wrong there, Dolores,” said Dumbledore, peering at her over his half-moon spectacles.

Jules stared blankly, but Neville thought he got it, and had to suppress a reluctant grin. He wasn’t a whole lot fonder of Dumbledore than Harry, who might happily murder the man if he was given the chance and promised no consequences. Still, the man was clever.

“Oho!” said Fudge, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet. “Yes, do let’s hear what ridiculous thing Dumbledore would have us believe this time! Perhaps Grindelwald has come back and joined forces with _another_ recently resurrected Dark Lord, or the Muggles have found us all out and they’re coming for our wands, or maybe it was Potter’s identical twin in the Hog’s Head that day? Except, no, that wouldn’t work, because Hadrian Black wants nothing to do with you!”

Percy Weasley laughed, hearty and fake. “Oh, very good, Minister, very good!”

Dumbledore was smiling gently. “Cornelius, I do not deny—nor, I am sure, do Julian and Neville—that they were in the Hog’s Head that day, nor that they were trying to recruit students to a Defense Against the Dark Arts group. I am merely pointing out that Dolores is quite wrong to suggest that such a group was, at that time, illegal. If you recall, the Ministry decree banning all student societies was not put into effect until two days _after_ the boys’ Hogsmeade meeting, so they were not breaking any rules in the Hog’s Head at all.”

Percy looked as though someone had hit him in the face with a brick. Fudge remained frozen mid-bounce. Neville kind of wanted to try and push him into the fire.

Umbridge recovered first. “That’s all very fine, Headmaster,” she said, smiling sweetly. “But we are now nearly six months on from the introduction of Educational Decree Number Twenty-four. If the first meeting was not illegal, all those that have happened since most certainly are.”

_Wonder what she’d say to us learning Dark magic in a secret Chamber belonging to Salazar Slytherin’s heirs and controlled by Parseltongue, led by halfblood Hadrian Black, the children of several Death Eaters, little old me, and a couple Muggle-borns?_

“Well,” said Dumbledore, surveying her with polite interest, “they certainly _would_ be, if they _had_ continued after the decree. Do you have any evidence that these meetings continued?”

As Dumbledore spoke, Neville heard a rustle behind him and rather thought one of the Aurors whispered something. He could have sworn too that something brushed between him and Jules, a gentle something like a draft or bird wings, but looking down he saw nothing.

“Evidence?” repeated Umbridge. It now seemed as if she was smiling as wide as physically possible without breaking her face. “Have you not been listening, Dumbledore? Why do you think Miss Edgecombe is here?”

“Oh, can she tell us about six months’ worth of meetings?” said Dumbledore. “I was under the impression that she was merely reporting a meeting tonight.”

“Miss Edgecombe,” said Umbridge instantly, “tell us how long these meetings have been going on, dear. You can simply nod or shake your head, I’m sure that won’t make the spots worse. Have they been happening regularly over the last six months?”

Neville’s stomach turned. And then—to the amazement of everyone in the room—Edgecombe shook her head.

Umbridge quickly looked at Fudge and then back at Edgecombe.

Neville looked at Dumbledore, saw no worry whatsoever on the man’s face. Remembered Harry’s list of Order members. A list that included one Kingsley Shacklebolt.

Suddenly he thought he could take a very good guess what spell had shot between him and Jules—had shot through a gap that was Kingsley’s only clear line of fire on Marietta Edgecombe.

“I don’t think you understood the question, did you, dear? I’m asking whether you’ve been going to these meetings for the past six months? You have, haven’t you?”

Again, Edgecombe shook her head. Neville was quite sure of his theory now.

“What do you mean by shaking your head, dear?” Umbridge said testily.

“I would have thought her meaning was quite clear,” McGonagall said. “Shaking one’s head is, after all, a gesture meaning _no_ that is understood by dozens of cultures the world over. Miss Edgecombe, did you mean to tell us that there have been _no_ secret meetings over the last six months?”

Edgecombe nodded.

“But there was a meeting tonight!” Umbridge said furiously. “There was a meeting, Miss Edgecombe, you _told_ me about it, in the Room of Requirement! And Potter was the leader, Potter organized it, Potter— _why are you shaking your head, girl?_ ”

Umbridge gripped Edgecombe’s shoulders and started shaking her.

Shacklebolt, Dumbledore, and McGonagall all started forward. Dumbledore raised his wand and Umbridge leaped back, shaking her hands as though they had been burned.

“I cannot allow you to manhandle my students, Dolores,” said Dumbledore, sounding angry for the first time.”

“You want to calm yourself, Madam Umbridge,” said Shacklebolt, in a deep, slow voice. “You don’t want to get yourself into trouble now.”

“No,” said Umbridge breathlessly, glancing up at the towering figure of Shacklebolt. “I mean, yes—you’re right, Shacklebolt—I—I forgot myself.”

“Dolores,” said Fudge, “the meeting tonight—the one we know definitely happened—”

“Yes,” said Umbridge, pulling herself together, “yes… well, Miss Edgecombe tipped me off and I proceeded at once to the seventh floor, accompanied by certain _trustworthy_ students, so as to catch those in the meeting red-handed. It appears that they were forewarned of my arrival, however, because when we reached the seventh floor they were running in every direction. It does not matter, however. I have all their names here, someone dropped them as they were running away…”

And to Neville’s horror, she withdrew from her pocket the cursed parchment.

“The moment I saw Potter’s name on the list, I knew what we were dealing with,” she said softly.

“Excellent, Dolores,” said Fudge. “Excellent, really excellent. And… by thunder…”

He walked up to Dumbledore, who was still standing by Edgecombe, wand held loosely in one hand. The Ministry people all seemed to have overlooked the implied threat that was Albus Dumbledore holding a wand. Idiots.

“See what they’ve named themselves?” said Fudge quietly. _“Dumbledore’s Army.”_

Neville flinched. He’d _known_ that name was stupid.

Dumbledore reached out and took the parchment. He examined it expressionlessly for a few seconds, and then handed it back, smiling. “Well, the game is up. Would you like a written confession, Cornelius, or will a statement before these witnesses suffice?”

McGonagall looked over Neville’s shoulder in Shacklebolt’s direction with unmistakable fear.

“Statement?” said Fudge slowly. “What—I don’t…”

“Dumbledore’s Army, Cornelius,” said Dumbledore, waving the list of names with a smile. “Not Potter’s Army. _Dumbledore’s Army_.”

Understanding blazed in Fudge’s face at the same time as Neville figured it out. The old goat was taking the fall for Jules.

Damn. He was going even farther than Neville would’ve thought to keep Jules Potter in Hogwarts.

“You?” Fudge whispered.

“That’s right,” Dumbledore said pleasantly.

“You organized this?”

“I did.”

“You recruited these students for—for your army?”

“Tonight was supposed to be the first meeting,” Dumbledore said with a nod. “Merely to see whether they would be interested in joining me. I see now that it was a mistake to invite Miss Edgecombe, of course.”

Edgecombe whimpered. Fudge looked from her to Dumbledore, his chest swelling. “Then you HAVE been plotting against me!” he shouted.

“That’s right,” said Dumbledore cheerfully.

“NO!” Jules shouted.

McGonagall widened her eyes threateningly at him. Neville took advantage of their robes to subtly tread on Jules’ foot. He looked wildly from Neville to Dumbledore and then back to Neville, with shock and guilt in his eyes.

 _Bit late to the party, aren’t you?_ Neville thought, glaring sideways at the Git Who Lived. Bully Who Lived, as Neville had called him, privately, in first and second year. He was better now and Neville had forgiven, but not forgotten.

“Be quiet, Jules, or I am afraid you will have to leave my office,” said Dumbledore calmly.

“Yes, shut up, Potter!” Fudge barked. He ogled Dumbledore with horrified delight. “Well, well, well—I came here tonight expecting to expel Potter and instead—”

“Instead you get to arrest me,” said Dumbledore. “It’s like losing a knut and finding a galleon, isn’t it?”

“Weasley!” cried Fudge. “Weasley, have you got it written all down, everything he’s said, his confession, have you got it?”

“Yes, sir, I think so, sir!” said Percy eagerly, whose nose was splattered with ink from the speed of his note-taking. Neville frowned in his direction. Was the idiot a wizard or not? DictaQuills _existed_ , after all.

“The bit about how he’s been trying to build up an army against the Ministry, how he’s been working to destabilize me?”

“Yes, sir, I’ve got it, yes!” said Percy.

“Very well, then,” said Fudge, now radiant with glee. “Duplicate your notes, Weasley, and send a copy to the Prophet at once. If we send a fast owl we should make the morning edition!”

Percy dashed from the room.

“You will now be escorted back to the Ministry, Dumbledore, where you will be formally charged and then sent to Azkaban to await trial!”

“Ah,” said Dumbledore, “yes. Yes, I thought we might hit that little snag.”

Neville found himself unbearably curious as to what, exactly, Dumbledore was going to do to escape.

“Snag?” said Fudge, vibrating with joy. “I see no snag, Dumbledore!”

“Well, I’m afraid I do.”

“Oh really?”

“Well—it seems you are laboring under the delusion that I am going to—what is the phrase? Oh yes. Come quietly. I am afraid I am not going to come quietly at all, Cornelius. I have absolutely no intention of being sent to Azkaban. I could break out, of course—but what a waste of time, and frankly, I have a whole host of things I would rather be doing.”

Umbridge was, by now, bright red. Fudge stared at Dumbledore with a silly expression. Neville wanted to slap one of them, or both, or possibly every idiot who’d thought this _absolute bumbling fool_ was a decent candidate for Minister of Magic. These people ran the bloody _government?_

Fudge turned and looked at the Aurors. Dawlish drifted forward, one hand reaching almost casually for his wand.

“Don’t be silly, Dawlish,” said Dumbledore kindly. “I’m sure you’re an excellent Auror, I seem to remember that you achieved Outstanding on all your NEWTs, but if you attempt to—er—‘bring me in’ by force, I will have to hurt you.”

Dawlish blinked, looking rather foolish.

“So,” sneered Fudge, “you intend to take on Dawlish, Shacklebolt, Dolores, and myself single-handed, do you, Dumbledore?”

“Merlin’s beard, no,” said Dumbledore. “Not unless you are foolish enough to force me to. I could not win such a duel without causing at least one of you grievous harm and I’ve no desire to do so.”

“He will not be single-handed!” said McGonagall loudly, plunging a hand inside her robes.

“Oh yes he will, Minerva!” Dumbledore said sharply. “Hogwarts needs you!”

“Enough of this rubbish!” Fudge said, pulling his own wand. From his pocket. Just like Dawlish and McGonagall. An Auror, a professor, and the Minister, none of whom seemed aware of the concept of wand holsters. Neville’s was spelled unnoticeable and resistant to summoning, self-cleaning, and made of finest dragonhide. Much more convenient than a _pocket_.

“Dawlish! Shacklebolt! _Take him!”_

A streak of silver light flashed around the room. Neville’s dueling reflexes kicked in and he hit the floor. Jules was a fraction of a second behind him. There was a bang, and the floor trembled. Another silver flash went off—portraits yelled, Fawkes screeched, and a cloud of dust filled the air. Neville began to cough.

“No!” someone shouted.

Several more seconds of groans and shuffling, and then—silence.

Neville struggled a bit and got to his knees. McGonagall had been crouching protectively over him and Jules, glasses askew. She’d dragged Edgecombe down to the floor, too. Dust floated gently down through the air. A tall figure moved toward them.

“Are you all right?” Dumbledore said.

“Yes!” said McGonagall, hauling Edgecombe to her feet. Jules and Neville followed suit.

The dust cleared at a wave of Dumbledore’s wand. The office was a wreck. Dumbledore’s desk had been overturned, all the spindly tables had fallen over, half the silvery instruments were in pieces, and Fudge, Umbridge, Shacklebolt, and Dawlish lay motionless on the floor. Fawkes soared wide circles above them, singing softly.

“Unfortunately, I had to hex Kingsley too, or it would have looked very suspicious,” said Dumbledore in a low voice. “He was remarkably quick on the uptake, modifying Miss Edgecombe’s memory like that—thank him for me, will you, Minerva?”

“Moral high road, huh?”

McGonagall shot him a chastising look. Dumbledore peered at him but Gran did ‘wise old person’ way better than him and Neville stared right back at them, unrepentant.

Dumbledore eventually decided to move on. “They will wake very soon and it will be best if they do not know that we had time to communicate—you must act as though no time has passed, as though they were merely knocked to the ground, they will not remember—”

“Where will you go, Albus?” whispered McGonagall. “The Burrow?”

“Oh no,” said Dumbledore with a grim smile. “I am not going into hiding. Fudge will soon wish he’d never dislodged me from Hogwarts, I promise you…”

“Professor Dumbledore…” Jules began.

“Listen to me, Jules,” Dumbledore said urgently. Dawlish began to stir. “You must study Occlumency as hard as you can, do you understand me? Do everything Professor Snape tells you and practice it particularly every night before sleeping so that you can close your mind to bad dreams—you will understand why soon enough but you must promise me—close your mind—you will understand.”

He finished in a barely-audible whisper, fingers closed over Jules’ hand. Jules just stared at him in confusion and maybe a bit of anger.

Fawkes swooped low. Dumbledore let go of Jules, reached up, and grabbed the phoenix’s tail. They vanished in a flash of fire.

“Where is he?” Fudge yelled, pushing himself up from the ground. _“Where is he?”_

“I don’t know!” shouted Shacklebolt, also leaping up.

“Well, he can’t have Disapparated!” cried Umbridge. “You can’t inside the school—”

“The stairs!” cried Dawlish, and flung himself out the door. Shacklebolt and Umbridge were right behind him. Fudge hesitated, then got to his feet slowly.

There was a long and painful silence.

“Well, Minerva,” he said testily, “I’m afraid this is the end of your friend Dumbledore.”

“Think so, do you?” McGonagall said scornfully.

“You’d better get those two off to bed,” Fudge said with a dismissive nod.

However, Neville had absolutely no intention of running off to bed like a good little boy. Neither, it seemed, did Jules. They stopped inside the portrait hole, looked at each other in unison, and walked right back out.

“Where are you going?” Neville said.

“Pitch.” Jules’ hands were convulsively opening and closing. “Borrow—someone’s broom. Just—fly for a bit, clear my head.” He looked sideways at Neville. “Want to come?”

“No,” Neville said. “Thanks. I, er—are you all right?”

“Fine.” Jules rolled his shoulders. “Malfoy’s stingers hurt but I’ve taken worse in training duels. You?”

“They left me alone. Cowardly weak Neville Longbottom, not worth targeting,” Neville said, too tired to restrain himself.

Jules bit his lip. “Yeah, I, er—I’m sorry. For…”

He didn’t finish, but Neville didn’t need to make him. “It’s okay,” he said with a shrug. “You were never the worst of them and—it’s fine. I’ll prove them all wrong.”

“Doesn’t make it okay,” Jules muttered, “but fine. I’m glad you kicked Ben’s ass, at least. He needed a wake-up call about his dueling skills. And thanks for helping get everyone out tonight.”

“Of course,” Neville said. “I… d’you know what Dumbledore will do?”

Jules shook his head. “No idea… he’s got some plan, knowing him, but he hasn’t told me what it is. Or anything, really. Apparently he won’t even try to stick around to protect the students.”

Neville wasn’t exactly Dumbledore’s biggest fan, but he felt compelled to point out, “He has the other teachers to do that. Even Snape’ll stick up for a student against Umbitch… except maybe you and Ron… and he knows about the DA.”

“Yeah. I guess.” Jules looked grim, determined. “We’ll just have to make up for him being gone, then. Sure you don’t want to come fly?”

“Yes,” Neville said. He could fly but he’d never like it. “Have fun.”

“Yeah, you… wait, what _are_ you doing?”

“Going to go find somewhere to just be alone for a bit,” Neville said, a partial truth that Jules accepted without hesitation.

“Right, have fun. Try to get some sleep tonight,” he said, and jogged off down the corridor.

Neville frowned after him. Jules really was turning out rather decent. 

The Fat Lady never told on curfew-breaking Gryffindors unless the Headmaster specifically ordered her to, which meant Neville had gotten quite good at sneaking around when he had to. It didn’t take long to find an empty classroom, where conjured a wooden ball, hit it with a Bouncing Charm, and started chucking it at the wall. 

Throw, bounce, catch. Throw, bounce, catch. The rhythm was soothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: lots of things change between canon and AU spell use, I admit. The general level of nastiness achieved in revenge and dueling by the Vipers is significantly above canon in most instances. In this instance, I made the curse on the parchment quite a bit nastier, because canon Hermione actually has a *hell* of a ruthless streak and in this instance it felt appropriate to dial that up a bit, given that she’s spent several years hanging around a group of people not exactly known for their restraint.


	6. Chapter 20

Hermione and Harry showed up thirty minutes later. 

“How’d you know?”

“Snakes,” Harry said.

Figured.

“So,” Hermione said. “Dumbledore’s gone.”

“He’ll do anything for the bloody Boy-Who-Lived,” Neville grumbled.

Hermione bit her lip. “I don’t like him any more than you, but—with him gone, who will keep Umbridge in check?”

“We will,” Harry said. “And the other teachers. We’ll work it out.” He tugged his journal out of his pocket and flipped it open.

“I don’t… can we do this tomorrow?” Neville said. “I’m not really up to a planning session. Lot on the brain lately. And tonight was—a lot.”

“Like what?” Hermione with the insatiable curiosity, _again_. Neville glanced at Harry— _can I tell her?_ —and Harry nodded minutely.

So Neville did.

She was gaping by the time she was finished. “So… Professor Dumbledore, he… examined them. And said they were—that he couldn’t…”

“Fix them, right,” Harry said absently, nose buried in his journal. He was scribbling away every few seconds. Writing someone, or multiple someones.

“Harry!” Hermione swatted him.

He looked up, blinking poison green eyes at her. “What?”

“That was _insensitive!”_

“It’s fine,” Neville said. He was well used to Harry’s—emotional difficulties at this point. If he ever came across as empathetic or considerate, it was most likely fake. Neville was mostly flattered that Harry trusted him enough to not bother with a façade around him.

Or… much of one, anyway, because occasionally he caught a glimpse of something _else_ lurking behind even the Harry here tonight, which was the version he only showed to his immediate friends: a clever, ambitious, lonely boy carrying far too much responsibility and doing so much better than most adults could manage. Neville wasn’t sure he liked the _something else_ but it never seemed to get out of control and, hey, if Harry didn’t want to share, that was his choice.

He shook off those thoughts. “Hermione, stop staring at us, it’s not _that_ ridiculous a thing to say.”

“You,” she snarled at Harry, “have the emotional range of a _tablespoon_ , and I only say tablespoon because I used _teaspoon_ on Ronald last year. And you—” She rounded on Neville, somehow managed to look frightening even as she visibly softened. “Neville, I… don’t understand how this—happened. How they—haven’t gotten better.”

“She gives me gum wrappers.” The words fell out of Neville’s lips unbidden and he watched the ripples they made in the silence. “Every time I go… to visit. Crumpled tinfoil. I could probably paper my walls with them.”

Harry, for once, looked very uncertain. Hermione just threw herself forward and into Neville’s arms; he caught the bushy-haired girl and relished the comfort of her presence. She had been his best friend in Gryffindor for years and this was… familiar.

“Is this… where I… join in?” Harry said.

Neville actually grinned at that, even though he hadn’t felt less like smiling in a good while. “Normal two-person hugs confuse you enough, mate, I don’t think we need to explode your brain by making it three.”

“I feel like I should be offended.”

Hermione pulled away. “Yes, but you’re not, because you know Neville is correct and you have serious issues with physical and emotional vulnerability due to an abusive childhood. Shut your mouths, I read in the summers and most of what’s available to me is Muggle science once my book allowance runs out.”

“You can always borrow—” Harry and Neville said simultaneously, and broke off, grinning at each other.

“I know.” Hermione grimaced. “But…”

“What?” Neville said when she didn’t keep going.

“My, er. Parents prefer if I… focus on Muggle subjects in the summer… also, Mum picked up a book I left out one time, and it, you know, noticed she didn’t have a magical core.”

Harry sighed. “Who’d you borrow it from?”

“…Daphne.”

“Oh Merlin,” said Neville, who could only imagine what kind of nastiness you might find on a book from the Greengrass family. “What did it do?”

“I had to take her to the Leaky so I could regrow her fingernails without setting off the Trace.”

Harry dropped his head into his hands. “Hermione, you _know_ better than to leave books like that out around Muggles, even if they are your parents—”

“Yes, all right, I know it was stupid, but I literally just _went to the bathroom_ and it was sitting on my desk—”

“Speaking of books,” Neville said loudly, because Harry and Hermione or Theo and Hermione could argue for literal hours about almost anything that involved the intersection of magical and Muggle worlds. “I found some _really_ interesting ones in the Room today, hang on, they didn’t even think to have me turn out my bag, the tossers. I haven’t gone through them yet but I asked for things that talk about Dark magic. Unforgivables, specifically.”

Hermione and Harry both perked up. “Oh?” Harry said.

“I’ll bring them to the Chamber tomorrow,” Neville said with a grin. Bloody predictable, both of them, for all Harry liked to play the impenetrable Slytherin puppetmaster.

“We, ah. Might not need them… to test… this particular spell,” Harry said delicately.

Neville’s body caught up to that statement before his brain did. Every muscle went tense and he twisted to fully face his friend even while blank shock still radiated through his head.

“You—you— _what?”_ Hermione shrieked.

The noise cut through his confusion like a knife. Neville put things together. “Meaning _you’ve_ confirmed it,” he said quietly.

Harry’s nod was very slow.

Part of Neville was aware of exactly how much trust this was, and aware of the Slytherin tendency to test people’s trustworthiness, and that part was yelling for him to watch his step here. Most of him was appalled. His stomach was sick. Unforgivables were _bad_ , they were evil, irredeemable—

“On _rats,”_ Harry said. “Not people, Circe, both of you calm the fuck down.”

Neville took a very deep breath. Hermione was as pale as he’d ever seen her.

“Why?” he said.

“It’s powerful.” Harry didn’t flinch or falter. “Enough to shatter any shield other than heavy conjured stone without losing its force on the target. But it doesn’t _kill_ , like Avada Kedavra, and it’s more immediately debilitating than Imperius, and one brief use has no long-term side effects. The Cruciatus is… a last resort, I suppose. I learned it for safety purposes.”

Okay. That made sense. Neville tried his best to wrap his head around that. _Magic is intent_ , they’d all been saying for years, and it wasn’t like he’d balked at learning the entrails-Expelling Curse as a _powerful last resort spell,_ so…

“ _Could_ you cast it on a human?” Hermione said cannily.

Harry frowned. “Possibly. Probably. It takes—quite a mental headache. I’ve been working on the Unforgivables as absolute last-resort options since Fake Moody’s lessons. It took most of fourth year before I could cast any of them even on a small rodent without getting a migraine. But—sufficiently pissed off, or terrified for my life…”

“This might… take me a bit,” Neville admitted. “To—accept.”

“I know.” Harry spun his wand absently around his fingers. Amazing how he that gesture could be a nervous tic or a threat depending on the context. Right now it was the former. “I—wasn’t sure how you guys would react.”

“Is this going better or worse than expected?” Hermione said.

Harry half-smiled. “Better.”

_Harry_

“Sirius Black.”

Harry only had to wait a few minutes before Sirius picked up his mirror. His godfather’s grinning face filled the glass. “Harry!”

“Hey, Sirius, how are you?”

The entire mirror shook, and Sirius looked over his shoulder. “I’m, ah, well I _was_. On a date.”

Harry choked. “You were _what?_ Why didn’t you tell me you had a date?”

“I met her in a club in Knockturn two nights ago, calm down.”

“Wait, there’s clubs in Knockturn?” Harry couldn’t decide what he should be focusing on here.

Sirius frowned at him. “Yeah, what, did you think they just lurked under Diagon? Or we went out to Muggle bars?”

“I… didn’t think about it, to be honest.”

“Good. I’m a total hypocrite for saying this, of course, but you shouldn’t be thinking about clubs. Or going to clubs. There, I’ve hit my adult person responsibility quota for the month, planned any pranks recently?”

 _Put two people in the hospital wing, gave another few vicious muscle cramps whenever they say ‘junior Death Eater’ or ‘spawn’ or ‘slimy,’ helped my best friend clean up the mess he made torturing some fellow students._ “No, been too busy.”

“Ah. Pity.”

“Tell me about your date, then,” Harry said.

Sirius winced and looked over his shoulder. “Yeah… so turns out she’s just a glory hound. Also, morbid as fuck. Started asking me what my worst memories were and what it was like to almost be Kissed and she was trying to be seductive while she was at it? Which, no. And _then_ she started asking about _you_ , and… started hinting at—actually, I’m not going to finish that sentence. Anyway. I pretended that a friend just had an emergency and I bolted.”

Harry felt his lips twitch. “Lord Sirius Black, who endured the Cruciatus Curse as a child, fought Death Eaters, survived twelve years in Azkaban, won a legal battle against Dumbledore and the Potters, and cleaned out Grimmauld Place… ran away from a fangirl.”

“You shut up,” Sirius said, scowling. “I did not tell you this so you could make fun of me.”

“What in Merlin’s name were you expecting? Sympathy?” Harry snorted. “Surely you’ve got Hufflepuff friends for that.”

“I hate you sometimes,” Sirius muttered.

“Yeah, yeah.” 

Sirius looked over his shoulder again. “Fuck, she’s _following_ me. Who _does_ that?”

“You’re a wizard,” Harry said. “Apparate already.”

“I _wanted_ to go to Magical Notes,” he grumbled. “Weird Sisters have a new crystal out. But _nooo_ , I’ve got a stalker wandering around Diagon.”

Harry gave up trying to hide his amusement.

“Wipe that grin off your face,” Sirius muttered. “Hang on.”

His face tightened in concentration. For a second, the mirror flashed black, and the image jittered and resettled on Sirius with Grimmauld Place in the background. “Want to say hi to Kreacher?” he said. “He’s doing better but… I’d still prefer to have you deal with him.”

“Can’t hurt.” Harry would take any chance to reinforce the house-elf’s loyalty.

“Right, hang on.” Sirius opened the door and yelled, “Kreacher!”

A muffled _crack_ came through the mirror, and then indistinct words. The image jostled wildly and then Kreacher’s ugly wrinkled face filled the mirror.

“Hi, Kreacher, how are you?” Harry said.

The elf’s ears quivered. “Kreacher is good, Master Harry,” he croaked, performing some kind of spastic half-bow that made the background image jerk. Harry caught a glimpse of Sirius halfway through rolling his eyes.

“Glad to hear it. Do you need anything? For the house?”

“Some of Master Harry’s potions stores may be spoiled,” Kreacher said, doing another spastic jerk. “And Kreacher thinks there is a boggart in the airing cupboard. Kreacher can’t do it because elf magic doesn’t hurt boggarts.”

“I’ll ask Sirius to see to it. Thanks,” Harry said.

“Yes, Master Harry.” Kreacher’s eyes were wide by the time Sirius took the mirror back.

Sirius was silent for a second, then he looked down. “What did you _say?_ He just ran into the drawing room and I think he’s crying.”

“The elves that haven’t been treated well are _really_ lonely,” Harry said. “Just offer some kindness and they’ll flip. He says there’s a boggart in the airing cupboard.”

“Of course there fucking is,” Sirius said. “I hate this house sometimes. I’ll do it tomorrow. Oh—I need to ask you something.”

“No, I won’t help you hide a body,” Harry said instantly. “Just Apparate somewhere weird and dump it, it’s not that hard.”

Sirius snorted. “Nothing to do with murder. Vanessa and Hazel’s house has a jarvit infestation and they need somewhere to stay while the place is getting decontaminated. They’re planning to rent somewhere and I was thinking… we could, you know, offer them. A room. At Grimmauld Place.”

Harry opened his mouth—

“Not permanently,” Sirius said in a rush. “I mean, obviously, but we have a ton of empty rooms on the second and third floors, and the house has a ton of wards built in so it’s not that hard to create some extra space and put more rooms in if we have to, and also I was thinking you could—some of the old families would be weird about it if any of your friends stay here over the summer, especially the younger ones, since I’m, you know, the only adult in the house and not exactly known for being responsible and shit—”

“As entertaining as this ramble is, you don’t have to convince me,” Harry said drily. “I was going to say yes.”

“You—what? Oh. Okay.” Sirius blinked a few times.

“Were you expecting me to say no?”

Sirius shrugged, scratching behind his ear. “I… well, it’s only our—third summer. There. And I didn’t know if you’d, you know, not want other adults around. And then there’s… whether you’d trust them.”

“I trust them to an extent,” Harry said slowly. “I _like_ them, and want to trust them, and I know we worked well with Vanessa in the trials.” He’d have to be discreet about some things, probably, and it’d be annoying to have to cast anti-eavesdropping wards more often than he usually did when he was home, but he could work with it. “Just… maybe don’t key them into the library wards.”

Sirius nodded. “Done. And let’s not tell them about Black Castle—they might want to see it and I don’t even want to know what kind of weird Dark shit my family’s got stashed in there.”

Harry would absolutely be using it when he was older. They owned a fucking _castle_. Also a manor in the south, and a town—which he would absolutely be visiting at some point, too. Not for a while, probably, but in a few years, when Sirius was in a better headspace and dealing with his Lord Black duties, maybe when Harry was working on his potions Mastery. He’d go down to Riasmoore, set Kreacher loose on Black Manor, spend a few months brewing and experimenting and exploring in peace.

He shook off the dreams. It was a nice plan, but it would probably be a while before he’d have the kind of peace and quiet he needed to feel comfortable just spending a month off in the countryside. “Good, then. Yeah, I don’t have a problem with that at all.”

“Awesome, I’ll write them.” Sirius grinned widely. “Some of our friends will probably… drop by. On the weekends.”

“Meaning you’re probably going to throw parties,” Harry said.

“Maybe.”

“Give me advance notice when you can, and keep it confined to the basement,” Harry said. “With sound wards up. I don’t really want to expose Graham to your kinds of parties. Or, honestly, myself.”

Sirius stuck his tongue out.

“Very mature,” Harry deadpanned.

“Yes, that’s me, mature and responsible and shit,” Sirius said. “Oh crap I left a potion brewing, be right back.”

The mirror clattered on the kitchen counter and settled on a view of the ceiling.

Harry actually laughed. 

_Graham_

“Hey,” Veronica said. “Guys, check the Prophet.”

Liam shook his open and his eyes bugged. “Holy crap.”

“What?” Malcolm said, trying to lean over his shoulder.

“Get your own,” Liam said, slapping at him.

Graham leaned across the table and snatched Liam’s Prophet. Neither he nor Malcolm noticed, too busy fighting. As per usual.

**Ethan thorne sentenced to one year in Azkaban**

_Though examinations of the evidence have dragged out the Thorne Affair, a sentence has finally been leveled. Thorne faces one year in Azkaban for use of illegal blood magic on minors and impersonation. Representatives of his backers, Houses Vance, Macmillan, and Potter, were not available for comment._

“Azkaban,” Veronica murmured. “I… wow.”

Graham could only nod. That was serious. He sneaked a glance up the table at the fifth years’ section; Blaise and Pansy were nearly radiating smugness while Harry, Daphne, and Theo were unreadable like always. Other Vipers had either guessed or been told about the plan. It wasn’t hard to figure out, not when each of them had a blood-bound notebook disguised as class notes.

Harry looked up at that second, saw him staring, and smiled for about half a second.

Laughing a little, Graham looked back down at the Prophet, thinking for the millionth time how grateful he was to have met Harry.

“Turn the page,” Veronica advised.

“What else is there?”

She winked at him. Graham’s face felt hot for some reason. “You’ll see.”

“Oh Merlin,” he said, when he’d turned the page. “Skeeter? Didn’t Hermione do something to her?”

Veronica kicked his ankle. Across the table, Malcolm and Liam’s argument had somehow devolved into whose family home had worse décor. “Sh.”

“Right, sorry.” Graham ducked his head. He was surrounded by Vipers, the four of them plus the second years, but she had a point.

**THE POLITICS OF HOUSE POTTER**

_By Rita Skeeter_

_Child neglect and abuse, illegal blood magic, lying to a court, accessory to malfeasance of office—the crimes committed by House Potter and its associates just keep piling up in recent years. Hardly a single person in magical Britain wasn’t shocked by the trials of Lord Potter and Albus Dumbledore two years ago for leaving young Harry Potter, now Heir Hadrian Black, in an abusive Muggle home for eleven years. Just as horrifying was the conspiracy arranged between Albus Dumbledore and James Potter to condemn Lord Sirius Black to Azkaban for twelve years for a crime he never committed. Suspicions abound that Ethan Thorne has been aware of the conspiracy for some time now outside the oaths of a solicitor, but he has never been tried._

_Law Master Thorne has, however, been tried for the use of illegal blood magic—and been found guilty. The magic he used was benign and passive, a tracking spell placed on journals given to minors. What’s suspicious is the minors he targeted. Young Heir Black, an abused child cast out of his family and taken in by his wrongfully imprisoned godfather, has fought against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named to save his brother’s life. Yet still, it seems, Thorne distrusts him and the school friends who for three years were Heir Black’s only support._

_“We had to take matters into our own hands and rescue him from the Muggles when he was twelve,” Fred Weasley admitted just last week. “They locked him in his rooms with bars on the window, took away his wand and all his stuff, and fed him through a cat flap. He was let out once a day to use the bathroom. We only noticed when we started talking and realized he hadn’t answered any of our letters.”_

_Mrs. Molly Weasley, when pressed, corroborated the story, adding that her sons brought Heir Black to their family home for the rest of the summer, and that “he was so frightfully thin, I suspected something was wrong…”_

_Even beyond the disturbing aspects of a grown wizard illegally and secretly tracking children, the Potters have always been outspoken opponents of ministry restrictions on dangerous magics. Lord Potter gave a particularly vehement speech in the Wizengamot five years ago in which he stated “All magics that use the blood, hair, skin, et cetera of a witch or wizard should be banned or at the very least restricted!” Albus Dumbledore, then Chief Warlock, gave a speech immediately after that built on Lord Potter’s argument. Yet Ethan Thorne, Lord Potter’s close friend, managed to find a benign branch of so-called dangerous magics, and it seems he was willing to compromise the principles of his patron House and the man he’s called his role model, Albus Dumbledore._

_With Azkaban escapees on the loose, the Boy Who Lived possibly an unstable gloryhound, and the Potters and Dumbledores compromising their supposed principles, the politics of House Potter appear to be far more complicated than the “Light versus Dark” narrative they have forced down our throat for the past ten years._

Graham’s eyes were wide by the time he finished. “This is… really good.”

“Yeah, it is,” Veronica agreed, grinning.

Liam finally left off the argument with Malcolm and looked around. “Hey, give me my paper back, twat.”

“Hey,” Vasily said from the second-year group. “C’mon, let’s be polite.”

“Sorry. You _twit._ ”

Graham hit him on the head with the paper before he handed it over with a sunny smile.

“Boys are all brutes,” Veronica said.

Liam batted his eyelashes at her. “But you still love us.”

“I do,” she agreed. “Not sure what that says about me…”

“Good things,” Graham said. “Good things.”

_Harry_

“This is a direct result of Dumbledore leaving.”

Draco nodded, looking at his hands. “First thing she told me to do? _Target Mudbloods_.”

Hermione’s hair abruptly burst free of its styling charms and exploded into a frizzy cloud around her head.

Daphne sighed and smacked it with a charm from behind. “Hermione, hair.”

“I am too irate to care,” Hermione hissed. “That. _Woman.”_

“On the plus side, I got to take points off Bones and Weasley today,” Draco said with a shadow of his normal malicious grin. “And a bunch of their cronies.” He flicked the little silver _I_ pin on his collar.

“Tell me that included the precious Boy Who Won’t Get Off His High Hippogriff,” Pansy sneered.

“Of course. You’re joining, right?”

Pansy frowned. “I’m… publicly linked with Harry in a way you’re not. She might suspect.”

Harry snapped his fingers. “Draco, rope Crabbe and Goyle into this. Bulstrode, too—Pansy, you leverage her if you have to. And her brother from third year, Anita Strickland and Shawna Rayburn from sixth. Celesta already has an in.”

“Rayburn?” Blaise said. “She’s… not your biggest fan.”

“Seaton will almost definitely join, and we need at least a few sincere members,” Harry said. He looked at Pansy. “Keep Rayburn and Bulstrode in line. Draco, you’ve got Crabbe and Goyle, since they’re Malfoy vassals or some other painfully antiquated thing.”

Blaise tapped his long fingers together. “I’ll feel Seaton out.”

Harry grimaced. “I can’t decide if he was just testing me or actually wants me knocked down a few pegs.”

“I’m not sure… yet,” Blaise said. “Rule one won’t come in to play here with her technically being a Slytherin. He could go telling her tales.” He paused, tilted his head back and studied the rough ceiling of the Chamber above. “It may be better to have Everett go to him, actually… Everett’s clever, and they’ve been friends, loosely, for some time… also, he’s not known to associate with you.”

“Good point. If he becomes a problem, we sic Theo and Daphne on him,” Harry said.

Draco paled a bit. Theo and Daphne exchanged a smirk.

“I’ve got Millicent,” Pansy said. “Rayburn might take a bit of work but between Millicent and me we can either keep her away from anything important or _convince_ her not to say anything.”

Harry nodded. “Good. Draco, you’ve got the Malfoy name, Umbridge’s confidence, and the rest of us if you need more help. Keep the Inquistorial Squad in line. Pass on the people she’s targeting, play the role, have some fun, but don’t press people so hard that you make permanent enemies. Outside my brothers’ little club, anyway, because we’re past that already.”

“I don’t like this,” Theo muttered.

Draco slumped a little. “It’s like the prefect thing. Slytherins in positions of power…”

“She’s not doing it on purpose, though,” Justin said, joining in for the first time. “Dumbledore _hoped_ you’d go off the rails, get power-drunk, piss people off and alienate your House. Umbridge just likes the power.”

“She’s not subtle,” Daphne agreed. “Disgrace to the House.”

“Remind me where Hermione and Neville are?” Pansy said.

Harry rubbed his nose. “Keeping the twins in line. I don’t even want to know what the _Umbitch_ said to make them that angry. Neville can talk them down and Hermione said she’d curse them if he failed.”

“Luna?” Blaise said.

“Shouldn’t you know?” Theo said with a bit of a leer.

Daphne hit him.

“Thank you, Daphne,” Blaise said. “We’re not together anymore, Theo, do try to keep up.”

Harry tuned them out as the argument devolved into Blaise needling Theo and Theo getting progressively more vicious in his responses. Daphne watched them go like a tennis match and occasionally jumped in to keep things interesting.

This Inquisitorial Squad could be a problem. _Would_ be a problem. Especially if Draco didn’t live up to the test Harry had set him. Pansy and Blaise would cover him from behind the scenes, being the best with people, so if he flubbed it they wouldn’t have too big an issue, but he was starting to like Draco under all the assholery. In all his snobbish, haughty, intelligent, lonely, meticulous glory.

A very distant vibration surged through their feet.

All conversation cut off and the seven of them turned their eyes up to the ceiling. Nothing had changed; no dust fell or rocks clattered, but they hadn’t imagined it.

The familiar bond pulsed. Harry closed his eyes, cleared his mind, focused. It had stabilized lately at a point where he and Eriss could pass rudimentary intentions as well as emotions. Right now she was broadcasting urgency and _get here now_.

“Eriss wants us,” he said, already on his feet and moving. “We’ve got to go, something’s happening.”

“Journal’s going crazy,” Justin said. Pansy clamped onto his elbow and kept him from running into any walls as they jogged into the passage that led up to near the entrance hall. “‘Talked the twins down from murder to a major prank, general mayhem, and quitting school. Entrance hall, now.’ From Hermione.”

“This should be fun,” Blaise said.

Harry picked up the pace.

They paused just inside the passage. Eriss was on the other side; dim safety pulsed through the bond so Harry knew the hall was empty. He willed the passage open. It responded to Slytherin’s Heir, rumbled aside, spilled them into a little-used corridor off the entrance hall.

They heard the unmistakable rumble of a good-sized crowd as soon as they stopped.

 _“Go,”_ Eriss said. Harry didn’t need the encouragement.

Fifteen seconds later, they slid into the back of what seemed like three-quarters of Hogwarts packed into the edges of the entrance hall. On the stairs stood Umbridge like a mockery of justice in pink. And in the middle of the crowd, grinning like mad things, were Fred and George.

“Fiendfyre twins,” Luna murmured. Harry twitched—where had she even come from?

She smiled at him.

“Ma’am!” Filch croaked, hurtling down the stairs. “It’s spreading!”

Umbridge’s hair was wild as she whipped around. “Then _do something!_ Fetch teachers! With my authority!”

Filch turned and booked it back up the staircase.

“They took the nickname to heart, didn’t they,” Justin complained. “Merlin dammit. If they burn down anything important…”

“Whose definition of _important?”_ Pansy said. “Because I wouldn’t mind, say, the Inquisitorial Squad’s meeting room going up in flames.”

Breathing heavily, Umbridge bore down on the twins. “I will see you two _expelled_ for this,” she snarled.

Fred grinned. “Only for this?”

“You’d think she’d care about some of the other shit,” George said lightly, hands in his pockets.

“Language, Gred!” Fred said, shaking his finger. “There are—”

_“Quiet!”_

Both boys turned on Umbridge, expressions condescending. “You’re the one shouting,” George said snidely.

Most of the assembled students laughed.

Umbridge glared around furiously but with no specific target she was impotent. She raised her wand threateningly. “I have the Minister’s authority to reinstate some of the _old punishments_ for unruly students,” she hissed. “You’ll soon see expulsion is merely a trifle compared to what I can do!”

A _bang_ came from somewhere over their heads.

“And setting fires is only—”

“—the start of what _we_ can do.”

There was a shriek, and a flaming Catherine’s wheel firework cartwheeled down the stairs. It barely missed Umbridge— “You’d think their demon fireworks would aim better,” Theo sighed—slammed into a wall, and burst into four slightly smaller Catherine’s wheels, which shattered two windows on their way out to the grounds. Screaming from floors over their heads suggested that there were more fireworks.

Harry had been kept in the loop on the twins’ product development. He knew these fireworks—works of genius, really—and he knew full well they wouldn’t be going anywhere until the _significant_ amount of magic in them wore off. Several people nearby saw his grin and edged away.

“Ah, you wish to take on the Hogwarts High Inquisitor within my very school?” Umbridge recovered some of her usual sickly sweet composure, smiling. “Be my guest.”

“You know, Feorge? I don’t think we will,” George said.

“Yeah, Gred, I’d say we’ve somewhat outgrown full-time education,” Fred replied.

George smirked. “Time to test our talents in the real world?”

Umbridge drew her wand.

 _“Glacius,”_ Harry whispered. She temporarily froze.

“Definitely.”

Fred winked in Harry’s direction, then the twins raised their wands and said in unison, _“Accio brooms!”_

For a few seconds, nothing happened. Harry narrowed his eyes and prepared for something a little stronger than _glacius_ ; that would wear off any second, especially since he’d done it wandlessly—

With a _crash_ from the door, two brooms shot out of the nearest entrance to the dungeons and into their owners’ hands. George’s was still trailing ten feet of chain.

“We won’t be seeing you,” George said.

“Yeah, don’t bother to keep in touch,” Fred said, as he and his brother mounted their brooms.

_“Glacius_ ,” Harry whispered again, before his first spell could wear off. It would die again soon since he couldn’t use his wand but it was enough.

George looked around at the crowd. “If anyone fancies buying some Weasleys’ Wildfire, as demonstrated in our High Inquisitor’s office, a Portable Swamp, as can be tested in the east wing’s fifth floor corridor, or our prototype Freakish Fireworks, come to Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes,” he yelled.

“Number ninety-three Diagon Ally, our new premises!” Fred finished, and with that they kicked off.

Harry’s spell wore off. _“Stop them!”_ Umbridge shrieked, but with Filch gone no one seemed inclined to help her. Not too far away, Seaton shifted his weight a bit, but Harry pinned him with his iciest glare and the creepy sixth year very deliberately clasped his hands behind his back.

The twins shot twenty feet into the air. The iron peg on George’s broom swung dangerously. Umbridge tried to summon or Stun them, but racing brooms came spelled against _accio_ , George cut the chain off with a slash of his wand to clatter to the floor, bodies couldn’t be Summoned, and Harry insisted all the Vipers spell their clothes against Summoning, too. No one else so much as pulled a wand.

Fred and George looked back at the poltergeist bobbing over the crowd. “Give her hell from us, Peeves,” Fred said.

And Peeves, who had never been known to take orders from anyone but the Bloody Baron, swept off his hat and performed an elaborate aerial bow.

 _Fuck Umbridge_ , Harry thought, and as Fred and George shot out the two smashed windows, he enthusiastically joined in the tumultuous applause.

It nearly drowned out Umbridge’s furious shrieking.

They had to spend two hours standing in line for Umbridge to check every person in the entrance hall’s wand. Harry wore his most obnoxiously innocent expression when it was his turn. She glared and hissed _“Priori incantatem_ ” so venomously that spittle flew from her wide, fleshy lips, but of course nothing came up, and Flitwick stepped in when she tried to get him for using the _alohomora_ charm a few hours before, saying it was assigned practice for class. Harry smiled at the tiny Professor to thank him for the lie and left the hall without so much as looking at Umbridge. Horrid old bat.

Umbridge’s office had been gutted by something that seemed suspiciously like a highly controlled version of Fiendfyre. Harry hadn’t known about _that_ and wondered what else the twins were cooking up in their Chamber laboratory.

The entire fifth-floor corridor in the east wing had been turned into a swamp complete with flesh-eating fish, and Filch had to spend a week punting people back and forth across it, which meant the competition to take the twins’ place as Troublemakers in Chief got off to a roaring start. Nifflers got into the trophy room and Umbridge’s rebuilt office three times in the last two weeks of March, Flitwick halfheartedly tried and gleefully failed to remove the swamp, the fireworks caromed around the school setting things on fire and generally causing mayhem for a week and a half before they died, and everyone walked around with Bubble-Head Charms in place to avoid the constant smell of Dungbombs and Stinkpellets.

Meanwhile, Fred and George’s new products were making the rounds. A case of Weasley Wildfire had to be redirected out the window by Flitwick when it got dangerously near Ravenclaw Tower, where it happily scorched a few acres of lawn and the edge of the Forbidden Forest before it burned itself out. Fainting, bleeding, vomiting, or feverish students left class in droves, especially Umbridge’s, and told her only that they had “Umbridge-itis.” She put four successive classes in detention, although she didn’t dare use the Blood Quill on so many at once, but impressively, no one talked.

Harry sat out the pranking and insisted most of the Vipers do so as well, especially their Muggle-born members. “I know you’re out for blood,” he said one day, after stopping Veronica and Liam halfway up to the fourth floor, the first-year Slytherin Muggle-borns in tow. “I don’t care. I can only heal blood-quill marks so many times before someone catches on, and if you get caught she might even try something worse than that. Don’t give her the satisfaction of catching Muggle-borns in open rebellion.”

Veronica glowered but Liam and the firsties had the sense to drag her back to their common room.

The professors even joined in where their students couldn’t. Harry _definitely_ saw Snape bungle several potions he was brewing for the hag, Flitwick refused to do more than twirl his wand without asking permission, and rumors were going around about McGonagall advising Peeves on how to best sabotage various light fixtures in the school.

Barty laughed himself nearly sick when Harry told him all the stories. “Glad to see our youth haven’t lost their fighting spirit,” he said. “I might have to drop by your friends’ new store. In disguise, obviously.”

“Obviously,” Harry said with a smirk. “I’m guessing you wouldn’t dare offer a Nosebleed Nougat to Riddle.”

“Maybe Dolohov.” Barty’s eyes darkened for a second, but then he shook off the odd mood.

Harry leaned back and kicked his right ankle up on his left knee. He thought he knew Barty well enough by now to detect a significant lie. It helped he’d cast a lie detection spell on a plain silver ring currently hiding on his right hand, the strongest he knew. Also, Eriss was slowly learning how to scent lies, as she got older and stronger. Between all his contingencies he had reasonable confidence he could pick up on it if Barty lied to him about this.

“Barty. If you win this war… what do you plan to do about Muggle-borns and Muggles?”

Barty’s shoulders tensed and all the residual emotion drained out of his face. Harry watched him closely, felt Eriss coiling into ready position beneath his chair. Before he threw his weight one way or the other—he had to know.

“You’ve no doubt heard we want to kill the Muggles and Muggle-borns.”

“That, or slavery was mentioned, I think,” Harry said.

“Propaganda.” Barty made a face. “Doesn’t help my lord had some—more radical ideas in his youth. No one is logical at fifteen. Except maybe me. And there were—circumstances. He said some things to certain people—” _Dumbledore,_ Harry inferred—“that have been held against us. But we, as a political movement and later what I’m well aware could be considered a terrorist organization, never advocated for genocide or mass enslavement.”

The ring didn’t heat up, and Harry didn’t spot any lies, but there were some glaring holes in that story. “ _Mass_ enslavement.”

Barty frowned at him. _“_ Fucking Slytherin. _Any_ enslavement. Slavery never works in the long term, particularly not when the enslaved have as much magic and intelligence as the slavers. Magic’s such an equalizer that even wandless slaves could effectively resist. It died out among our kind nearly a millennia before the Muggles caught on and it’s _still_ a problem for Muggles in Africa and Asia. It doesn’t work so great for them, either, but _especially_ not for us. And even setting aside the issue of trying to enslave a human who can do _magic—_ slavery just creates resentment, inefficiency, population and propaganda control issues, and ruins any moral arguments one might make for the sake of persuading foreign witches and wizards to our side.”

“And this time around?”

“Why are you asking this?” Barty snapped.

A sneer twisted Harry’s face. “You _know_ why.”

Barty nodded slowly. “There’s been talk of simply abducting Muggle-borns at birth, but a big part of our problem is the Ministry of Magic trying to control our magic and, therefore, us. In the end we’re too leery of handing it excuses to increase its workforce to take that route.” He paused. “I assume I don’t have to tell you that this doesn’t leave this room.”

“And some associates of mine,” Harry said. “Should they ask.”

“Trusted associates?”

“Obviously.” Harry realized as he said it that he’d sounded _exactly_ like Snape, and winced.

Barty’s lips twitched but he didn’t comment. “Fine. The present plan is to find ways to introduce Muggle-borns to our world earlier and erase the conflict of interest. For starters, we need to get the wizarding culture class requirement reinstated, but there’s a _lot_ of pushback in the Board of Governors, which our dear friend Albus has mostly under his thumb. The exception is Malfoy but he has to tread carefully since he’s so outnumbered. And Muggles can be left alone as long as they leave _us_ alone. The problem is laws like the Muggle Protection Act. Anyone who’s not hopelessly naïve knows a Muggle can seriously injure even an armed wizard—we need _serious_ battle shields to block projectiles moving as fast as their—firearms?—can produce. Battle shields ninety percent of our population can’t cast because it’s a specialized skill that you don’t usually need outside the Aurors and Hitwizards.”

“So repeal the blood magic ban, the Muggle Protection Act, overhaul the introductory process for Muggle-borns,” Harry said. “Anything I’m missing? No little nested clauses about Muggle-borns being second-tier citizens, or restricting their legal rights?”

“None.”

Harry waited a second. He saw no lie; neither Eriss nor the enchanted ring reacted.

Merlin damn it, this complicated things. He’d almost wanted to have a reason to stop heading down this path—but Barty wasn’t giving him one.

“I always thought the werewolf alliance made no sense,” he said under his breath. “If you lot were the purity snobs I heard you were…”

Barty shrugged his thin shoulders. “Well. _Some_ of us are. The Malfoys are pretty bad—or Lucius is, at least. Carrows, too. The Flints, what’s left of the Shafiqs… They don’t _like_ associating with werewolves, necessarily, but they still think werewolves, even Muggle werewolves, are a damn sight better than Muggles. Also, frankly, it was a simple matter to gain their support. Promise legal rights and human status, and get ninety percent of an extremely dangerous group backing you up.”

Harry nodded. He’d probably have done the same. “Umbridge,” he pointed out. Her anti-“half-breed” prejudices were legend in the school. Someone had been following her around and casting illusion spells of centaurs, goblins, and merpeople jumping out at her. Several times he’d stepped in to cause a distraction while the caster slipped away. Patil thanked him for it the last time they met to pass potions, so he suspected the culprits were DA.

“Necessary evil. The worse she gets, the more support we have,” Barty said. “How many members of Dumbledore’s Order are Muggle-born? Or even Muggle-raised?”

“Few. I’ve been aware of that for some time.”

“Choosing sides?” Barty said with a smirk.

 _Making my own._ “Gathering information, I suppose. For now.”

“Mm.” Barty steepled his fingers. “Here’s some more, then. I spoke with Bellatrix.”

Harry sat up straighter. “Did you now.”

“She hadn’t thought about it in years,” Barty said. “Azkaban did a number on her. We have several master Legilimens from around the world helping with—recovery. My lord finally got a clear answer out of her. There’s no way with the spells they cast that Frank and Alice ended up permanently insane.” He went quiet, looking down at his hands. “I wouldn’t have stood there if that’s the way Bellatrix and Rodolphus took it. I—Alice killed Rabastan but it was a war, and they were always decent in school.”

The ring heated up a little at the last bit, and Eriss stirred. Harry wondered whether the whole wouldn’t-have-stood-there routine was fake or just the very last part about Frank and Alice being decent. It didn’t matter. “Most likely theories?”

Barty held his gaze over the desk for almost a full minute. He was completely unreadable. Thin, hollow-cheeked and razor-edged, still in a way that wasn’t quite human. Harry wondered if Barty had always been like this or if it was Azkaban and then nearly a decade under the Imperius that caused it. Where Harry was broken on the inside, Barty was just empty.

“Someone did it deliberately,” he finally said, so softly Harry almost didn’t hear. “My lord believes that’s the only possible answer.”

It hung between them—the mutual awareness of _who_ had most likely done it.

“Why?” Harry said.

“At first they were brainwashed schoolchildren, but then… they learned some things. Frank was a Selwyn as well as a Longbottom. Augusta taught him to be more—open-minded than some of his peers. He and Alice learned some things, changed their minds. My lord hoped to turn them, but then Alice got pregnant, and that—no one wants to raise a son in a war zone. They were negotiating for neutrality,” Barty said. “Alice reached out to us. They were going to swear neutrality oaths in exchange for one from my lord promising safe passage to the mainland and a free pass from any and all Death Eater interference for their son’s and future children’s natural lives. They wanted him to go to Hogwarts, so they had to be able to safely come back someday, but they didn’t want to live in a war zone even if they were neutral.”

It felt like Harry’s entire body had been doused in cold water. Not anger this time—that would come—but shock.

Even after _everything_ else, somehow he hadn’t completely believed… but it made sense. Other atrocities just as serious had been waved away in the name of this war. Losing the Longbottoms would seriously damage morale. It couldn’t happen. And once Jules defeated Riddle—once the war was temporarily won—the Longbottoms might have turned into political dissidents. Popular, powerful, and influential political dissidents.

“Do you have proof,” he whispered.

Slowly, Barty nodded. “It’ll take time, but I can get it to you.”

“You’re doing me a lot of favors,” Harry said.

“You and your brother are pieces in this game,” Barty said bluntly. “We used to think you were pawns. Don’t get conceited, neither of you is anything very powerful yet, but you can both tilt the scales, and no one’s quite figured out what color you are yet.”

 _Neither have I_. At least this answered his question, though. The Dark Lord wanted Harry on his side, wanted the young Slytherin with intelligence, inside channels to the Order, and a network of varyingly loyal people inside Hogwarts. Mostly Slytherins, to be fair, but at least two from every House.

“I’m going to do what I can to verify your evidence, you know,” Harry said.

Barty shrugged. “It won’t be faked, so verify away.”

Fair.

“We don’t really have time for a lesson anymore,” Barty said, checking his pocket watch. “Spent too long laughing about the hag, as you’ve so charmingly named her.”

“Speaking of, how much longer does she have to stay?” Harry said. “She’s really starting to get on—certain people’s nerves.” He was worried, also, that she would do something drastic. Their dear High Inquisitor was looking more frazzled every time they saw her, and her Inquisitorial Squad wasn’t much help, given that over half of them were directly influenced by Harry and the rest could be either frightened, bribed, blackmailed, or coerced into being useless to her. Even the DA was starting to notice that the IS was mostly for show, and Harry was ninety percent sure they’d started acting to play along.

Barty frowned. “It’d be best if you could hold off until the end of the year.”

“No promises.”

“Understandable, she’s insufferable,” Barty said.

“You’ve met?” Harry said.

“…Father had her over for tea on occasion.”

Harry cocked his head. “You know, the more I learn about your father, the less I like him.” 

Barty’s eyes got a bit distant. “Common occurrence, believe me. Same for your Muggle family.”

Vernon’s purple face flashed through Harry’s mind. He nodded.

Then he realized they were wearing identical expressions. Barty caught on at the same time and they both smirked a little.

Blaise slouched out of Snape’s office with a smirk.

“That was quick,” Theo said, as Draco went inside.

“Went something like this.” Blaise cleared his throat and sneered down his nose in a credible imitation of Snape. “‘You’ll be graduating in two years but until then I still have to pretend to care about your future. What do you plan to do with your useless carcass after that?’ ‘Oh, you know, start a gardening club, possibly a network of pen pals.’ ‘Poisonous gardens and information hidden in ciphers, I presume.’ ‘I don’t know anything about any such topics.’ ‘Of course you don’t, Mr. _Zabini_. Get out of my sight.’”

Theo was laughing and Harry grinning by the end of it. “We already did the career meeting thing with Lord Nott,” Theo said.

“Speaking of.” Harry raised an eyebrow at Blaise. “Your mysterious _family business_ wouldn’t have anything to do with poison and information trading, would it?”

“I’ll tell you someday,” Blaise said. Translation: _yes, but I’m not supposed to talk about it._ “In the meantime, have fun with Snape. The hag is in there. Apparently she’s insisting on supervising all these things.”

Pansy turned away from a conversation with Goyle. “ _I_ heard it’s giving the Heads aneurysms with scheduling, since none of their sessions can overlap.”

“You hear all sorts of things you’re probably not supposed to,” Theo said.

“What can I say, I’m talented,” she said, tossing her hair. Goyle followed the movement. For a second, Harry considered warning him off, but honestly it would be amusing to watch Pansy grind him into the ground with words and then stiletto heels if he tried anything, so he kept his mouth shut.

Theo snorted. “Talented my arse. You’re evil.”

“Same as you,” she said with a narrow smile. Goyle looked mildly alarmed. Maybe he had more sense than Harry had given him credit for.

Draco stalked out rolling his eyes. The door slammed behind him. He’d been even faster than Blaise. “Harry, you’re next.”

“Excellent,” Harry said.

Snape looked like he really needed Headache Cure. “Sit down, P—Black,” he all but growled.

Harry did as told. “Good morning, sir.”

“Oh, an _excellent_ one,” Snape snarled. If he’d been any more sarcastic his words might have caught on fire. “Dare I inquire after your plans for after Hogwarts?”

“World domination,” Harry said.

Snape blinked. Umbridge, lurking in the corner like an appallingly camouflaged toad-thing, stirred.

Harry smiled sunnily.

“Do not jest,” Snape said with a scowl.

“Apologies, sir,” Harry said. “I’ve no desire to rule the world, that sounds like entirely too much work and I like my free time. I intend to pursue a Potions Mastery, possibly one in Runes or Spell Creation as well, and eventually join my godfather so he can prepare me to take up our family’s obligations in the Wizengamot.”

“Severus, if I may,” Umbridge simpered. Harry didn’t flinch, didn’t turn to look at her. Snape’s eye twitched. “I’m curious if Mr. Potter—apologies, Mr. Black—has _quite_ the disposition for a Potions Master.”

Snape’s mouth twisted like he tasted something foul. “It is only natural that you might wonder, I suppose, as you have not known Mr. Black very long at all.” He looked back at Harry, whose cheerful smile didn’t slip an inch. “A Potions Mastery. You’ll need O’s in OWL and NEWT Potions, obviously, as well as Runes, Arithmancy, and preferably Transfiguration in case you ever intend to foray into alchemy. An E or O in Herbology would also be highly recommended, though unnecessary for all but the most prestigious Mastery programs. All of which I imagine you’re well on your way to achieving, thanks to your—extracurricular studies.”

 _Extracurricular is such a wonderfully versatile word_. “I am.”

“How are those studies proceeding?”

“Quite well, sir.”

Umbridge gave one of her horrid little coughs. “Professor Snape, I must remind you that all student research must be conducted with the authorization and supervision of a Professor. As no such paperwork has been filed this year, I find it… _unlikely_ … that Mr. Black has engaged in any legal extracurricular studies.”

Snape sneered down his nose at her. “Mr. Black has not been known to participate in any illicit activities whatsoever, whether they be extracurricular studies or otherwise.”

 _Never been caught_ , Harry interpreted.

She shifted her weight. “ _Furthermore_ , I was under the impression that in order to obtain a Potions Mastery, one must complete an apprenticeship with a Potions Master.”

“You are as well-informed as ever, Professor,” Harry said, channeling Lucius Malfoy until his tone and bearing nearly dripped oil. He half-bowed in her direction.

“ _Well._ ” Umbridge shuffled her parchments. “Such apprenticeships, Mr. _Black_ , are difficult to obtain, and given your… _behavior_ in my class, I highly doubt you might be able to convince a Potions Master to take you as their student.”

Harry half-turned in his chair so he could give her the blandest expression he could summon. “I had not known you had any issues with my comportment in your class, Professor. I’m very sorry for any disrespect I may have accidentally displayed.” Since he’d tried quite hard to hide how little he respected her.

Her eyes narrowed to mere slits.

Snape placed his hands on his desk with a little more force than absolutely necessary, drawing attention back to him. “As the only certified Potions Master in the room, I believe my own advice may be relevant to this discussion?”

Umbridge nodded curtly.

“Mr. Black, having taught you for all five of your years at Hogwarts, it is my belief that you will have little difficulty finding a Potions Master who will accept you.”

“Actually, Severus—”

Snape looked at Umbridge with enough disdain to kill a small rodent on the spot. “Dolores, you may find that the temperament required for Potions is rather specific. Mr. Black has been nothing but inquisitive, deliberate, cautious, inventive, and respectful in my classes.” He looked back at Harry. “Have you begun researching Potions Masters to whom you might write requesting an apprenticeship?”

“I’d like to spend a year or two studying under Katya Dimitrova in Moscow if she’ll take on another student,” Harry said instantly. “But her laboratory has four other Masters and nine apprentices already.”

“She’s one of the best in the world,” Snape said. “I would, however, recommend you gain your Mastery before applying there. Master Dimitrova tends to allow fellow Masters studying with her much more flexibility in their research. You should also learn Russian or Bulgarian.”

“Who would you recommend for my initial apprenticeship, then, sir?” Harry said.

Snape’s lips thinned. “There are few Potions Masters in the world, and fewer I think you could effectively work with.”

Harry frowned a bit. “How so?”

“You enjoy experimentation,” Snape said.

Umbridge leaned forward. “ _Mr._ Snape, I must again point out that _experimentation_ in _any_ subject is _forbidden_ in accordance to the very first Educational Decree!”

Snape didn’t even look at her. “And to the best of my knowledge, Mr. Black has engaged in no experimentation since that Educational Decree came into effect. I spoke only of conversations he and I have had in the past in which we discussed possible alterations to student potions.”

Umbridge fumed but there was nothing she could do. Academic discussion of theoretical potions experimentation was perfectly legal, especially as Snape had a Mastery which came with certain leeway as far as personal experimentation and research. Harry was having a really hard time not turning around to grin at her.

“ _As_ I was saying,” Snape drawled, “many Masters are very strict with their apprentices, particularly in the early stages of their studies. Potions errors have the greatest potential for disastrous consequences of nearly any field of study and we tend to be cautious.”

“So I would need to find someone willing to allow incentive in an apprentice,” Harry said.

Snape nodded. “Precisely. I shall compile a list. Speak to me again before you graduate, and do not contact any of them until your seventh year at the earliest. Few would even consider an application without NEWT scores to examine.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Mm.” Snape’s lip curled. “As to your Wizengamot duties, I recommend speaking to your godfather, and perhaps any… other people with whom you are acquainted as well since he spent the greater part of his adult life in prison.”

Harry nodded. “I have begun exploring the responsibilities I’ll take on, yes. And developing my own opinions. Every Heir should be able to justify their beliefs, shouldn’t they?”

“Indeed they should.”

Umbridge stood up, breathing heavily. “ _Mr._ Black, I must recommend against pursuing any career on the Wizengamot. You may find yourself _opposed_. The Minister wields _considerable_ power and the Wizengamot—”

“Makes the laws the Ministry enforces,” Harry pointed out innocently. “And dissenting voices are really important in politics. I think that was Thomas Jefferson that pointed that out so vehemently, I know he was American but still.”

“And a _Mudblood,”_ Umbridge hissed.

Harry grinned. “Oops.”

“That will be all, Mr. Black,” Snape drawled. “Send Miss Parkinson in next, if you please.”

As the door closed behind him, Harry grinned at Pansy. “Have fun. Umbridge is in there and she’s _fuming.”_

“I think I’ll tell Snape I want to be a stripper in a Muggle club,” Pansy said. She fished a mirror out of her purse, shoved it at Theo so he took it on reflex, and started tousling her hair. “I’ll even do the just-had-sex hair thing.”

“Tug your robes down a little,” Theo suggested.

Pansy glared at him. “Mirror-holders should be… neither seen nor heard, actually, just fade right into the background.”

“What?” He rolled his eyes at her. “I can’t even tell you how uninterested I am in your boobs, okay? Sure, you’re pretty, but you’re terrifying and I’ve known you my entire life, so no thanks.”

“Glad to know my appeal hasn’t faded,” Pansy said. She snatched the mirror back and hit him on the collarbone with it before she jammed it back in her purse. Which did not look big enough to contain the mirror, let alone the four textbooks she’d had cycling in and out of there all day.

She caught him looking. “Hermione charmed it for me,” Pansy said, patting the seemingly delicate white leather bag with satisfaction. “She’s very good at Undetectable Expansion Charms.”

“Hermione’s good at most magic,” Theo said.

Pansy waggled her eyebrows suggestively at him and sashayed into Snape’s classroom. Harry could almost feel bad for Umbridge.

Almost.

_“Harry.”_

Harry glanced up from his cauldron. “ _Yes?”_

_“I think you should come.”_

_“Why? I’m in the middle of this—Polyjuice is really hard to experiment on, you know that…”_

_“I know you’ve been fretting about it for ages. Use one of the spells and come with me.”_

Harry sighed through his nose, cast the strongest stasis spell he knew, and left the Chamber laboratory. It almost definitely wouldn’t hold until he came back. Potions in progress were so volatile and reactive that they wore stasis spells out faster than nearly anything else. But Eriss knew not to interrupt his brewing unless it was important and he could feel her urgency.

She led him up and out of the Chamber, to the bowels of the dungeons, where almost every hallway was caked in dust and few people ever went. They weren’t far from Harry and Barty’s classroom, actually, which was now pockmarked with craters and scorch marks from their dueling and decidedly not dusty.

“ _Up ahead,”_ Eriss said, pausing at the end of a particularly gloomy hall. “ _Izzi heard them and found me. They are yours, so we keep an eye on them.”_

Harry wasn’t sure if ‘yours’ meant Slytherins or Vipers or both, but he thanked Eriss anyway, cast a Silencing Charm on his feet, and soft-footed down the hallway.

“…living with the Blacks.”

Graham?

“I _know_ , but… My parents.”

“They’d think of something.”

“I can’t ask.”

“Harry _offered._ Remember? At the end of last year.”

“Still. And what about Rio? I promised I’d keep in touch with him with Muggle ways and that would be hard to do from a magical home!”

“Ask. Harry.”

“Rio told me those things because I said I’d keep them secret, Graham.”

Harry had heard enough. He pushed the door open and sneered around at what once might have been a storeroom or even a cell at one point. “Nice meeting place. Really sets the atmosphere.”

Both of the younger kids stared at him for a few seconds.

“How much did you hear?” Graham said finally.

“Enough.” Harry conjured a chair and sat on it backwards, facing them. “You forgot the snakes go places humans tend to avoid. Veronica, I wouldn’t ask you to tell me what the Ingram kid told either of you in confidence. Secrets are valuable and trust rare in our House. I will say you should tell him to speak to me. Slytherin has… more than its fair share of kids from questionable households and if there’s anything bad going on at his…”

Veronica’s hands twisted together in her lap. “I—”

“Hands still,” Harry said, nodding at them. “Relaxed and open. Palms up is best but only if it looks natural. Learn your tells and control them.”

With a breath, she relaxed. Both hands fell open and still on her thighs, her shoulders loosened and lifted, and her face cleared. Graham twirled his wand in a familiar gesture, and Harry wondered when the kid had copied it from him.

“Better,” Harry said. “Now, what were you saying?”

“It’s not my secret to tell but—I’ll see if Rio might want to talk to you,” Veronica said quietly. “And I was—hoping to ask for a place… you said… we could stay at your house.”

“There’s plenty of room.” Harry was already preparing how he’d tell Sirius about this, making a list of all the orders he’d need to give Kreacher so the elf could prepare. He’d be ecstatic to have more people to look after. “Your parents…”

Veronica shrugged. “They’re both pilots. They’re gone a lot. We had a live-in nanny last summer but it’s expensive. And…”

“It’s hard to connect with people who don’t know our world?” Harry guessed.

“How would you know?” she said.

Harry’s lips twisted wryly. It was a genuine question, so he didn’t lash out even though he kind of wanted to. His was a different case from Veronica’s or Hermione’s. They actually liked their parents. “Hermione has had some similar issues. You’re welcome at Grimmauld Place as long as your parents are comfortable with it.”

“They will be,” Veronica said. “I asked already whether they’d let me stay with a school friend. I think they’d want to meet your godfather first.”

“Understandable.” Harry bit back a smirk. He’d have to help Sirius dress Muggle for that occasion. Maybe take him to get a suit fitted—that would be entertaining. “Is there anyone else I should be aware of?”

Graham and Veronica glanced at each other. “We’ll ask around,” Graham said. “I can think of a few people.”

Sirius would love having a bunch of young kids to corrupt. Harry nodded and stood up, vanishing the chair with a flick of his wand. “Send them to me. Anything anyone tells me is in confidence. I know some will be reluctant to say much, and that’s fine, but I do need to know at least the bare bones of their situations before I can spirit them away for a whole summer.”

“Makes sense,” Graham said. “Veronica, c’mon, I think Rio’s in the study group right now with the other firsties.”

Veronica nodded.

Harry stepped back and held the door for them. “I’ll start having rooms prepared. We only have a month and a half left of school.”

“Thank you,” Veronica said, beaming, and dashed off after Graham.


	7. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> here, have another one, why not

_Jules_

“We have to _do_ something.”

“What do you want to do, Parvati?” Ron snarled, kicking a desk. “Fred and George are gone, fucking prats, no one can figure out where the _hell_ they got the gold for a Diagon Alley lease, Mum’s blaming their escape on _me_ somehow, and now Umbridge has the run of the school. We _can’t_ do anything other than what we’re already doing.”

Jules leaned forward. His hands were clenched tightly together more of their own will than anything else. “We have to start the DA up again. I don’t care about Umbridge, or that she caught us before. We just have to be more careful this time.”

“And maybe not leave the parchment lying around?” Hermione snarled, dropping into a seat across from Parvati.

Parvati glared at her.

“And vary our meetings more,” Jules went on, to head off a fight. “And maybe set up watchers. I can get Dobby to help out, probably.”

Hermione crossed her arms. “You’ll ask him, and he’ll agree, and he’ll end up hurting himself for breaking the Headmistress’ orders. We use _my_ elf.”

Ron frowned at her. “You know, we’ve never _met_ this elf of yours.”

“She called Winky to help Dobby when they ambushed our meeting,” Jules said.

“I thought Muggle-borns couldn’t have elves—it takes a family to support one…”

“Winky!”

Hermione’s voice cracked almost as sharply as the sound of the elf appearing at her elbow. It bowed neatly. “Mistress called?”

Ron gaped.

Jules rubbed his forehead. Hermione’s elf was indeed Crouch’s old one, just like she’d said, except it—she—looked a lot different clean and well-fed and wearing a sheet toga instead of a filthy tea towel like last time. “Ron, are you happy now?”

“But—how?” Ron said.

“Sorry, Winky, just proving a point,” Hermione said, glaring at Ron still. “Would you be willing to be a lookout during our Defense club meetings?”

“Of course, Mistress Hermione,” the elf said. “Will that be all?”

“Yes, thank you.” Hermione waved a hand and Winky disappeared again.

“I’ve never heard an elf talk like that,” Jules said.

Hermione shrugged. “That’s because most people don’t bother to educate them. They don’t grasp language quite like we do—she still uses third person to refer to herself all the time—but with a bit of effort they’re perfectly capable of speaking more properly.”

“What effort?” Ben muttered. “Shoving a dictionary down its throat? Wait, my bad, that’s what you do to yourself.”

“It’s called reading, Creed, you should try it. You might’ve gotten higher than As on your OWLs,” Hermione said tartly. Ben fumed.

“ _Stop_ it,” Parvati said. “We _were_ talking about the DA!”

“Right. So now we have a lookout,” Jules broke in, shooting her a grateful glance. It was nice having Hermione around because she was one of the best duelists in the DA, but she could be really annoying. And argumentative. “That’s good, ‘cause only Dobby saved any of us _last_ time.”

“Also, I’ve been thinking.”

“You’re always thinking,” Ron muttered.

Hermione ignored him. “—and this time, if Umbridge shows up, we should just stay inside the Room and ask it not to let her in. It does what we want. If someone’s in there and doesn’t want to be found it doesn’t work.”

“How d’you know?” Jules said.

“I tested it.”

He frowned. “With who? We all said we wouldn’t tell…”

“The twins, before they left,” she said coolly.

“Good idea,” Parvati said grudgingly. “And it works?”

Hermione nodded.

“Awesome.” Jules ticked another thing off his mental list. “And we really have to be more careful about the membership this time.”

“No more Cho,” Parvati said firmly.

Jules hesitated. He liked Cho. A lot. But—it was _her_ friend… and those excuses about Marietta’s Ministry mum pressuring her seemed kind of flimsy. “Fine. We don’t invite Cho back. Luna doesn’t like her, so we don’t have to worry about her telling Cho.” Hermione made some kind of aborted motion. “Will any of the other Ravenclaws be a problem?”

“Nah, we just explain,” Parvati said briskly. “They’re logical, they’ll get it. Anything else?”

“Don’t think so.” Jules checked his pocket watch and winced, digging for a packet of Floo powder in his robes. “Also, I’m almost late, I need to go.”

“Meeting?” Ron said knowingly.

He nodded.

“How’d you get Floo permission?” Hermione asked. “Umbridge has the fireplaces on lockdown.”

“Dad claimed Heir business,” Jules said. “Old Wizengamot rules, for Heirs of noble Houses. Ministry can’t interfere. Umbridge threw a right fit but she’s stuck.” It had been very satisfying.

Hermione shrugged. “Have fun, then.”

“I probably won’t but I need to go anyway.”

He felt eyes boring into his back as he walked away, but Jules didn’t turn around. Everyone watched him lately. Umbridge, Dumbledore, his other teachers, all his classmates whether they thought he was insane or the prophesied Chosen One. This was nothing new.

 _“You have one hour,”_ Umbride had said when she grudgingly authorized the Floo. He checked his watch. Four exactly.

“Potter Manor!” he said, throwing down the powder.

A few seconds later, he stepped out into his entrance hall. The ancient family wards doused him in their magic and he closed his eyes and relished it. Home.

“Jules!”

“Dad,” he said, falling into his father’s embrace.

 _Harry’s never felt this_ , a little part of him whispered. _And now he never will._

Jules silenced the voice. Harry had had his shot, and Dad had fucked it up, but it was done now and they all had to make the best of it. Harry had Sirius. Jules had Dad. They all had Voldemort to deal with so family issues needed to take a backseat.

“How are you?” Dad said.

“Good,” Jules said. It was a lie but his face was buried in Dad’s shoulder and Dad only picked up on his lies when they were face to face.

“Glad to hear it.” Dad squeezed him once more and let go. “C’mon, everyone’s in the living room.”

He wrapped an arm around Jules’ shoulders as they walked. Jules leaned into the contact. They hadn’t been able to even write more than empty vague letters this whole year. The last time he had a real conversation with Dad was at Christmas break.

Now they didn’t even have time for one.

Half the Order was in their living room, it seemed like. Mad-Eye, Molly, Dung Fletcher looking twitchy as usual, Mrs. Tonks and Nymphadora-call-me-Tonks-or-I’ll-hex-you, Dedalus, Lady Bones, and—

“Remus!” Jules hurtled across the room and grabbed his pseudo-godfather in a hug.

“Jules,” Remus said, hugging him tightly. Jules could feel all his ribs through his patchy robes. “How are you?”

“Good, you?” Jules said, beaming at him. Remus had never been around, never even owled them, during Jules’ childhood, but Dad explained that he had a rare and painful magical disease and trauma from the war, and he’d wanted to be left alone. Jules still heard endless stories about quietly witty, clever Remus and mischievous, canny, loyal Peter growing up. The day Remus showed up at Potter Manor out of the blue two summers ago had been awesome, and he might not be Jules’ godfather, but he was still a piece of their family.

When they announced him as the new Defense professor, and Remus _winked_ over at the Gryffindor table, it was the first time Jules saw any of the prankster spirit from Dad’s stories.

“Eh… I’m all right,” Remus said. His smile was thin and tired. Behind him, Andromeda sidled closer and rested a hand on his shoulder for a brief moment. Dad’s expression darkened as he took in Remus’ generally battered appearance.

Jules’ eyes narrowed.

“Umbridge’s anti-werewolf legislation from a few years back has made it almost impossible for me to find a job,” Remus explained softly. “She just forced through a new one and it’s worse now, I need registration to buy food.”

“Live Muggle,” Jules suggested, horrified. “Also, how the hell didn’t that make the papers?”

“Language,” Molly scolded from the sink.

Conversation among the rest of the Order stilled for a second, then picked back up.

Remus sighed. “I can’t live Muggle when I need to take almost a week off every month. There’s almost no job that I could hold for long. James has been changing my galleons to Muggle money so I can buy… food and necessities. And it didn’t make the papers because the Ministry has the Prophet under its thumb.”

“Maybe you should mention that in another little radio talk,” Tonks said, flopping into a seat across from them. Her hair was purple today. “Brilliant, by the way.”

“Has Harry had any issues because of it?” Andromeda said.

Jules frowned. “I dunno, we don’t talk much at school. Part of his cover.” Though he wasn’t convinced it was a cover at all. “Why would he?”

Remus frowned and eased into a seat next to Tonks. Andromeda sat down on the other side of her daughter. Jules immediately plopped down across from them. “Well… he’s in Slytherin,” Remus said. “You publicly announced that he actively fought You-Know-Who and killed one of his Death Eaters, and you also implied that he’s so mentally unstable he doesn’t remember it. The Slytherins would take advantage of both those weaknesses.”

“I… didn’t… think of that,” Jules said, feeling abruptly nauseous. “He didn’t say anything.”

“He wouldn’t.” Andromeda pressed her lips together. “I’m a Slytherin myself, you know. I know how we think. Never ask for help because you’re unlikely to get it. It’s a sign of weakness if you can’t solve your problems on your own.”

“I’m his brother,” Jules protested. “Him being… disowned doesn’t change that.” 

“From his perspective, you and James have treated him pretty badly,” Mrs. Tonks said evenly. “Of all the people he’d go to with a problem and ask for damage control, you’re near the bottom of the list.”

“We talked about this,” Dad protested. “We tried to help him.” 

Andromeda shrugged. “I’m just explaining how he likely sees all this, not what I actually think of past events.”

Jules gripped his knees.

“He can deal with it,” Dad said. “We have bigger problems.”

“Dad,” Jules said.

“You-Know-Who? Big evil baddie out to kill you? Ring any bells?” Dad raised both eyebrows at him. “Jules, I know you care about Harry, and that’s nice of you, but seriously. That interview needed to happen. People need to know the truth.”

Jules bit his lip. “I know.”

He still didn’t want to do anything to hurt Harry. The thought that he’d caused that much trouble—

“Anyway, Dumbledore has a plan we need to discuss,” Dad said. He whistled and waved at the rest of the group; they broke off their conversation and gravitated toward the seats Jules, Remus, the Tonkses, and Dad had taken over. “To draw out You-Know-Who.”

“Why?” Dedalus said. “He’s not doing anything—hasn’t done anything except break his followers out.”

Andromeda leaned forward, all business. “And that’s the problem. He’s no doubt trying to repair the fourteen years of dementor damage done to the people he broke out. The sooner we can force a fight, the weaker he’ll be.”

“But we can’t bloody _find_ them,” Charlie Weasley said, frustrated.

Molly whacked him with a spoon. _“Ow_ , Mum,” he complained.

“No, we can’t find them,” Andromeda said. “At a guess, they’re using one of the old family manors that’s warded to high hell and out of Ministry jurisdiction. Lestrange or Malfoy would be the most obvious but several of his other _followers_ have viable options in their names. Gringotts won’t release bank statements and we can’t easily surveil the Knockturn Alley entrance to the bank. That leaves setting a trap.”

“And we have something he wants,” Jules realized. “The thing in the—Ministry.”

He’d almost said Department of Mysteries, which he wasn’t supposed to know about. Snape probably told Dumbledore that Jules had asked about it, but he didn’t have to say anything else.

“Right,” Dad said. “And… it can only be accessed by you or him.”

“I’ve got to go, then,” Jules said. It was a relief. To _do_ something instead of sitting around training—

“No,” about five different people said at once.

He looked around in disbelief. “But you’ve just said—”

“It’s not _safe_ ,” Molly snapped. She was pale and her grip on the wooden spoon was shaking. Charlie wrapped an arm around her shoulders and she shoved him off. “You are a _child_ , no matter that you’re—the Boy Who Lived.”

“She’s right,” Dad said.

“You’d have gone!” Jules said hotly, glaring at his father. “If it was you—”

Remus put a hand on his knee. “We made a lot of foolish choices when we were fifteen, Jules,” he said, voice heavy with regrets.

He’d talked about the dangers of three animagi and a werewolf running around the Hogwarts grounds in the same tone.

 _“Fine,”_ Jules said. “Then how are we going to do this?”

“We put in word at the Ministry that you’ll be coming to see the item,” Mrs. Tonks said. “We’ll do a credible job covering it up, so it looks real.”

“I’ll make sure it leaks,” Lady Bones said, sipping tea. “A dropped file, a misfiled copy of some paperwork, and one of his plants. None of them is particularly well-placed in the Ministry hierarchy but high enough to be dangerous.”

Mrs. Tonks nodded. “Then we send in a double—”

“That’d be me,” Tonks said, smirking. Her hair shortened and darkened until it was a carbon copy of Jules’. “I can’t change my sex but I have a little leeway in height and weight to work with. Enough to pass as Jules Potter. Oooh, I could walk up Diagon Alley, have all the pretty girls fawn on me…”

“You will _not_ ,” Molly said, scandalized.

Tonks pouted.

Andromeda sighed. “Nymphadora will take your place in transit. James and Hestia will pick you up at school with some Ministry representatives. We can’t assure the Ministry people’s loyalty, so you’ll have to find a time to swap with Tonks outside their view. The rest of us will make our way inside while the upper echelons are distracted by ensuring your security.”

“So I’m just bait,” Jules muttered. “Not even _me_.” No, it’d be _Tonks_ taking the risk. _Tonks_ pretending to be him.

He was the one in danger. No one else should have to take that on.

“I don’t want anyone else to die for me,” he said.

“I won’t, don’t get your boxers in a wad,” Tonks said, kicking him. “Seriously. I’ve got mad dueling skills.”

Molly made a little noise that everyone ignored.

“Is there _anything_ else?” Jules said.

Dad and Andromeda exchanged looks. “Keep training your friends,” Dad said. “It’s a brilliant idea.”

“We’re all very proud,” Dedalus said, beaming at him.

“Keep in touch with Harry,” Remus said. “I think it’s—best if you and he continue to have a connection.”

“I’ll try,” Jules said, watching not Remus but Andromeda. Her expression said she thought rather the opposite. She was the Slytherin, the one who knew how Slytherins operated better than Remus—what did she know?

“I’ll bring you home for the final discussion sometime in late May, probably,” Dad said. “With a date, time, all those details. We just wanted to let you know now.”

“And you can’t tell me what it is he wants,” Jules said.

Everyone shook their heads. “It’s not safe,” Dad said. “Snivellus says your Occlumency still isn’t good enough. Just telling you this much was a risk but we’ve done it because we need you on board and Dumbledore thinks You-Know-Who hasn’t noticed the connection yet, since there haven’t been any side effects.”

“Since the graveyard, anyway,” Jules pointed out.

Dad nodded. “Since the graveyard. Which was probably just a passive reaction to you two being close together.”

“Okay.” Jules nodded. Made his choice. “I’ll do it. I’ll tell Ron and Parvati and the rest enough so they can cover for me, help out if something goes wrong.”

Remus smiled, a little wistfully. “It’s good you have friends like them.”

“Any… any word on Ethan?” he said, almost afraid to ask.

Dad’s face darkened. Molly looked at her lap. Most of the rest looked grim or worried in turn. “He’s not allowed visitors,” Dad said. “They’ve got him in a magic-dampening cell that has less dementor presence. It should only take a few weeks of mind healer visits for him to be well again when he’s out, but…”

“There’s no way he did it,” Charlie said. “Not one of us. Blood magic’s evil.”

“Not really,” Tonks said, throwing and catching an apple. “I mean, the stuff on the notebooks was passive. Skeeter kept harping on that so I looked it up and she was telling the truth for once. Some blood magic doesn’t hurt anyone.”

Jules should maybe research that. He’d thought it was all just about hurting people.

“He still didn’t do it,” Dad said.

Andromeda opened her mouth.

“And please don’t keep insisting Harry framed him,” Hestia said instantly.

Jules looked between them. “Am I… missing something?”

“They’ve had this argument before,” Mad-Eye growled without looking up from some weird device in his lap. He’d spent the whole meeting staring at it in silence.

“This took _serious_ magic,” Hestia said. “Faking a magical signature is supposed to be impossible. There’s no way a fifteen-year-old figured that out.”

“You’re underestimating him,” Andromeda said. “And underestimating all the reasons you’ve given him to hate James. _And_ Ethan. Family matters to a Slytherin, which protects James somewhat, but his lawyer best friend? Fair game.”

Dad sat stone-still, eyes dark. They never talked about this, not really; Jules wasn’t even sure Dad knew he blamed Dad for them losing Harry. It wasn’t worth fighting about—not when they had bigger issues.

“We might have been too cavalier about Hadrian, but James is right that he couldn’t have done this,” Dedalus said.

Mad-Eye grunted agreement.

“We should assume it’s the Death Eaters, but keep a closer eye on Harry anyway,” Remus suggested tiredly. “Does that work for everyone?”

Andromeda frowned, but nodded. Dad just looked angry.

_Andromeda_

“Remus. Wait a moment.”

The werewolf paused in the Potter gardens. “Yes?”

Andromeda looked around. “Where’s James?”

“Had an appointment at Gringotts,” Remus said, more relaxed now in her presence than he had been during the meeting. Andromeda felt herself doing the same. She’d been a few years older and in a different House and that meant she was never friends with any of the Marauders in school, but now that she’d spent a bit more time with Remus and James, she found herself genuinely liking the quiet werewolf. It was an unexpected bonus. Even James was fun and entertaining. She’d been prepared to put up with them for the year it took Ethan to get out of Azkaban, but it seemed the plan might be less of a chore than expected.

“Ted’s making a huge dinner tonight, a recipe he picked up in Ethiopia last month,” Andromeda said. “Want to come over and eat with us? You and James both. It’s way too much food for three people.”

“I… maybe,” Remus allowed. “I can… make up some lie for the other wolves.”

And he appreciated a free meal, but neither of them was tactless enough to say that. “Wonderful. Will you let James know? I promised Dora I’d go with her to Diagon, she wants my help finding a new wand holster.”

“Sure.” Remus rocked on his feet and suddenly looked uncomfortable. Andromeda hid her own amusement with practiced ease. She was no idiot and she’d noticed the way those two gravitated towards one another at Order meetings and sometimes on their own. Nymphadora didn’t have a subtle bone in her body and Remus wasn’t much better. “I’ll let him know, I was dropping by Potter Manor anyway. Oh, and did Ted get the recipe on his Healing mission? I thought that was in Ukraine.”

“It was, originally. There was an outbreak of some rare disease and the Uagadou Magical Hospital sent a request for volunteer aid to the ICW. Ted signed up. Said it was one of the most fascinating trips he’s ever been on.” Andromeda huffed a quiet laugh, remembering how he’d come home and rambled for literal hours about working with the African Healers, and how many different magical theories and Healing practices flourished across the massive continent.

“Hufflepuff,” Remus said drily. Andromeda laughed for real and he grinned.

“Dinner’s at seven, feel free to arrive any time after six,” she said, flicking her wand under cover of her robes as she spoke. “Floo will let you in.”

“James and I will probably get there around six-thirty. Why did you put up anti-eavesdropping spells?” Remus said.

Andromeda blinked. “You…”

“Noticed them, obviously.” He shrugged. “I’m… not normal but I’m still a good wizard.”

“Right,” she said. “Consistently near the top of your class. It drove Sirius nuts.”

They both stood in silence, remembering.

“Have you… spoken to him?” Remus asked.

Andromeda shook her head. “He doesn’t want to see me. I stuck with the Order.”

“Yeah, same,” Remus said quietly. “He… always held grudges.”

Just like everyone else in their cursed family. Grudges, darkness, callousness—Andromeda had always been frightened by the lot of them. Bellatrix with her moods and whims, quiet vicious Narcissa, creepy Regulus, and then wild Gryffindor Sirius. Even when they were kids he had a streak of cruelty as bad as his parents—never knew when to _stop_. It got better when they were in school and he had his Marauders to help keep him in line but even then many of their pranks took things too far.

She’d retreated into the quiet of Slytherin, where people let you alone if you showed your claws and didn’t hurt the House. Watched, held her tongue, gotten good enough grades to ensure she could get any job she wanted, made few friends. Among them a certain Muggle-born Hufflepuff. Ted had originally been a teenage rebellion, she would readily admit, but it had soon grown into something _real_.

Also, it pissed Bellatrix off to no end, and she always enjoyed doing that.

“He’s cut you off too?” she asked, when she realized her trip down memory lane had stretched awkwardly long.

“Sort of. We’ve had lunch in pubs and such, though not recently—since he adopted Harry.” Remus shoved his hands in his pockets. “He hasn’t invited me over. I haven’t asked. It’s… awkward.”

“Speaking of Harry…”

“We’ve already argued about whether he was behind the Ethan thing,” Remus said. “James agrees with you two but I’m not convinced.”

He looked tired and certain and like he didn’t want to be having this conversation. Andromeda, though, had spent seven years in Slytherin and more than twice that playing the Black family’s games, and she knew how to spot a bluff. Remus wasn’t convinced yet but he wanted to be. It was unconscious, it was subtle, but it was there.

“That kid is hiding something,” she said softly, insistently. “I’m a Slytherin, Remus. Every House has its own mindset and I’m the only one of the Order from his. Slytherin gets more than its fair share of children from abusive or otherwise bad households—growing up hiding from adults, doing everything for yourself, doing what you have to to _survive_ , that all tends to foster Slytherin traits. We hold grudges, take things personally. We know how to hide our talents and play the long game.”

Remus frowned. “But… hiding a magical signature. _Scholars_ haven’t been able to figure that out.”

“He’s a highly motivated teen no doubt holding a hell of a grudge against Ethan Thorne, with access to the Hogwarts library, the Black library, and several other old Dark family libraries through his _friends_ ,” she said flatly. “Name one scholar with all those resources. And he’s been at the top of his class for years now, and we both know how brilliant Lily was. I’d say it’s certainly far from impossible.”

“Yes,” Remus said slowly. “You’ve said all that before, though. It’s… definitely possible but I just don’t see him putting someone _in Azkaban_. And if it comes down to family libraries, the Death Eaters have access to more than Harry, not to mention You-Know-Who is quite the magical prodigy according to Albus.”

Time to push a little harder. “What do the Death Eaters gain from taking Ethan out of the picture?”

“Taking the Potters down a peg.”

“It does nothing in light of the trials,” Andromeda said flatly. “What’s one more scratch on a cauldron that’s already covered in them? James could easily have written Ethan off and condemned him, at least in public, for using illegal blood magic.”

“He didn’t, though,” Remus pointed out.

“That’s a moot point. He _could_ have, and the only reason he _didn’t_ was that you and Ethan convinced him to back Ethan, point out that the blood magic was harmless and try to spin it as Ethan protecting those kids by keeping an eye on at-risk children.” Which Andromeda thought was stupid; they should’ve written Ethan off to start with in public and then quietly brought him back into the fold once the tumult died down. James backing him made the trial that much more dramatic and kept Ethan in the public’s attention. “Ethan’s no danger to the Death Eaters on his own—the Potters are, but Ethan, no. Getting him out of the picture does nothing except give us another, more personal reason to hunt them down. Not to mention it _seriously_ deviates from their strategy of lying low and recovering.”

Remus hesitated.

“You were always the most logical of all your little group,” she said. She had to make him understand. “Hadrian is _dangerous_ , Remus, and the rest of the Order doesn’t want to see it.”

“If we alienate him, we’d have to worry about him as well as Voldemort,” Remus said. “Not that he could do a ton of damage, but some, certainly.” 

Andromeda tapped her wand on her thigh. “Remus, _think_. We’ve already lost him. He’s a Black, he’s close friends with the children of _confirmed Death Eaters_ , he’s predisposed to the Dark anyway—a Parselmouth, by Morgana. We cannot continue assuming that he’ll work with us unless we further alienate him. We have to assume we already have.”

“Yeah…” Remus rubbed a hand over his face. “You have a point. I just… a year in _Azkaban._ ”

“It’s entirely possible that some of his friends manipulated him into believing the sentence wouldn’t be that serious for non-malicious blood magic.” Possible, but improbable. Andromeda remembered looking into Hadrian Black’s eyes and suppressed a shiver. There was something wrong with that boy. He hid it very, very well, but she had grown up around people who were all different kinds of fundamentally twisted. And Ethan had crossed him in a very personal way.

Andromeda was certain that Hadrian would feed Ethan to the dementors himself given half a chance.

“That makes sense,” Remus said slowly. “What do you think we should do about it? I don’t—entirely agree that it _was_ him, but I will say it’s possible. So assuming that it was…”

“Keep Jules from getting too close to him,” Andromeda said instantly. “James will keep pushing for that because Albus wants him to but I think it’s too big a risk.” How James managed to agree with her about Hadrian while still dancing perfectly to Albus’ tune she did not understand, but then again he’d always been riddled with cognitive dissonance. “He has good friends in the Light. Convince him to focus on them. I don’t know him well enough for that, but you do.”

“I’ll try,” Remus said. “I already have been—different reasons, but yeah.”

Andromeda could read between the lines. Remus had been betrayed by a close friend, by two if you counted James lying to him about Sirius, and never wanted that to happen to Jules.

She could use that.

“Thank you,” she said, softly, letting herself visibly relax, like she was immensely relieved and comforted by his help. Remus softened an unconscious fraction in return. Compassionate people were easy to play and he’d be even more willing to help her with this now that he’d seen how much it meant to her.

“Of course,” Remus said. “Jules still cares about him, but some of the fights those two have had… I don’t know if they can ever completely move on.”

“That’s a start. And I suspect their… differences will get worse, not better, with time.” She couldn’t quite hide the pain that sprang back to life as she added, “Trust me, fights between siblings cut _deep_.”

Remus watched her for a few seconds. “I’ll do what I can.”

“That’s all I ask.”

“And I’ll keep an eye on Harry. Between the two of us… we’ll notice the signs.”

She nodded. “See you tonight, then?”

“Six-thirty.” Remus hugged her quickly, skin and bones under his robes, and then Disapparated with a _crack._

Andromeda stared unseeing at the space he’d just occupied. The truth was, none of the Marauders was perfect. No one could truly be friends with Sirius Black for long if they were as uncompromisingly upright as, say, Kingsley or Hestia. Remus had a ruthless streak he usually tried to hide, James _never_ changed his mind once it was made up and he was _brutal_ to people who violated his worldview or principles, and Peter… well. Peter was Peter. Remus was quiet, and logical, and principled, and he would help her watch the Blacks.

If Hadrian Black’s personal grudge curdled—well. She was pretty much the poster child for hating your family so much you did the opposite of what they’d want in every aspect of your life. James Potter and Ethan Thorne abandoned Harry to an abusive Muggle home at the age of one, and Julian, too young to think otherwise than James, turned on him as soon as the Sorting Hat put him in Slytherin. She had to cut Jules away from him before things got too far.

_Jules_

He chewed his lip and stared at the open journal.

Harmless. Innocent. Blank pages edged in silver stared up at him. The only weird thing about it was the plain handwriting across the top that said _Harry Black._

Unreadable, complicated, impossible Harry.

Jules never knew how to deal with him. What to say. Never _understood_ him.

Their brief exchange from thirty minutes ago flashed across his mind.

_JP_

_Astronomy tower, 30 mins?_

_HB_

_I’ll be there._

They needed to have this conversation, and it was happening any second, and Jules still didn’t know what to say.

The door creaked open and Harry stepped out onto the roof of the Astronomy tower. His hair was neat and short, robes clean-cut and perfectly tailored, the Slytherin crest bared proudly on his left breast. He looked like a picture, not a real person.

“Something going on?” he said.

Jules ran a hand through his hair. “Did my wireless interview cause you problems?”

Harry blinked. “What makes you ask that?”

“Someone… pointed out that I, um. Might have caused you some issues with how I talked about—that night.”

“Perceptive of them.”

“So you did have issues.”

Harry shrugged. _“_ Did, yes. Past tense. It’s been handled.”

“I’m sorry,” Jules said truthfully. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

“You never do,” Harry said.

_The hell is that supposed to mean?_

He counted four breaths of awkward silence before Harry spoke again. “Is that all you wanted to talk to me about?”

“No.” Jules took a steadying breath. “Just—I’m being kept out of the loop.”

“Your little Order meeting not go as planned?” Harry said mockingly.

Jules threw up his hands. “How do you always know everything?”

Harry rolled his eyes. “You’re the _Boy Who Lived_. When you pull one over on Umbridge and get Floo access out for an hour, people notice. It wasn’t hard to guess _why_ dear old Dad wanted you.”

“Fine,” Jules muttered. There was some not-quite-hidden bitterness in his voice when Harry talked about Dad now that he was looking for it. Andromeda apparently had a point.

Well, Jules loved his father and all but he wasn’t just a mini-James. “Yeah, there was a meeting. And they have a plan, and I can’t talk about it, but—they’re not telling me everything and I need to know what’s going on.”

“And you think I’m any more likely to know what the Order’s up to than you?” Harry said. “Really?”

“You know a lot of things you shouldn’t,” Jules said. “Just—what’s in the Department of Mysteries that might link me and Voldemort? I thought it might be a weapon—we talked about this—but they said only me or him can touch it.”

Harry’s expression didn’t change. “Do you know some people call you the Chosen One?”

Jules snorted. “Yeah, ‘cause they’re idiots. _Voldemort_ chose me. And what have I done?”

“You’re no slouch with a wand,” Harry pointed out. “You’ve fought him off, what, three times now?”

“Didn’t stop him coming back,” Jules said. “Didn’t save Quirrell.”

“Yeah, but he hasn’t gone on a murder spree,” Harry said. There was some kind of undertone to the words but Jules couldn’t figure out what. As per fucking usual. “I don’t think you’re actually this mad just because they’re not telling you things. It seems like they gave you a dangerous amount of intel, frankly.”

Jules scowled. “Fine. Someone else is taking risks for me _again_ and I _hate_ it.”

“It’s not a bad idea to hang back sometimes, you know,” Harry said. “You’re fifteen. Not equipped to go up against Death Eaters.”

“You did,” Jules said. “And you—” _Killed one._

Harry’s expression darkened. “I _lost_. If Voldemort didn’t want me alive for some reason, I wouldn’t be.”

“I’ve been training!”

“They are _adults_ ,” Harry snarled.

“I don’t want to be a coward and _hide,”_ Jules spat right back.

A muscle jumped in Harry’s jaw. “Coward. Right. Of _course_ hiding from a fight is always cowardly.”

“That’s the definition of cowardice,” Jules said. “Or part of it.”

“Right.” Harry smiled like it hurt. “For a second there, I forgot how you see me.”

“No—Merlin damn it, Harry, that’s not what I meant!”

“No? So you don’t think I’m a coward for suggesting you do the smart thing and hang back and wait?”

Jules paused. “I don’t want people taking risks for me! How is that a bad thing?”

“It’s noble of you,” Harry said, turning _noble_ into an insult. “So very noble, and so very likely to get you killed, and then where will your side be?”

“They’ll keep fighting,” Jules said. He knew it like he knew the feel of his wand in his hand. “They’ll always fight.”

Harry rubbed his forehead. “Yeah. I know. They’re still not wrong to try to make you hang back. Just because they’d keep fighting without you doesn’t mean they’d stand a _chance_.”

“Look, just tell me what it is,” Jules said. “You’re not my mind healer and we’re not going to agree on this anyway.”

“My best guess would be a prophecy.”

Jules blinked. “What?”

“Are you confused because you don’t know what that means, or because you didn’t think I’d tell you?” Harry said.

“I know what a prophecy means, you prat, I just—why would you think that?” Jules wasn’t about to admit he _hadn’t_ really expected an answer.

“It wasn’t hard to figure out. They study thought, time, love, death, and space.” Harry ticked off five fingers. “The nickname _Chosen One_ , some weird connection between you two, Voldemort’s strange fixation on killing a specific baby. There isn’t much known about the Department of Mysteries, but in certain circles it’s common knowledge that they keep prophecies and if one is made about you, you can view it.”

Jules reeled. A _prophecy._ “So—I might actually be—some kind of Chosen One?”

“More likely it’s just vague and half-assed, and you’re the best fit,” Harry said. “You take Divination, does Trelawney really strike you as predicting a fixed future?”

“She couldn’t predict rain if she was staring at heavy gray clouds.”

“The future changes, Jules. There’s a prophecy, I _think_ , because it makes sense, but you’re not bound by it.”

Jules cocked his head and thought all this through. Harry was unreadable. All these word games weren’t Jules’ strength. Something just didn’t add up. “Why are you being so helpful?”

Harry let the silence drag out for a few seconds. “You’re my brother. Like it or not,” he said finally. “I’d as soon not see you hurt. So _listen to me_ and stay out of this. If I’m right, you’re more important than just something you did in the _past_.”

“I defeated _Voldemort._ ”

“How?”

Jules flinched.

“That’s right,” Harry said, eyes intent. “You don’t _know_. I always thought Mum did something. But if there’s a _prophecy_ , then _you need to stay alive_.”

“Okay,” Jules said, looking down. “Okay. Fine.”

Harry said something else, about cowardice versus self-preservation, probably normal Slytherin wordplay to justify his own cautious nature. Jules didn’t listen. He was too hung up on the thought of a prophecy.

It made sense. Merlin, but it made sense. Dumbledore always coming by when Jules was young, teaching and training and grooming him… Dad’s pride and affection, going beyond even just happy for his son’s fame, _reveling_ in what Jules meant to people… how he’d managed to defeat Voldemort in the first place. And now, like Harry said, Voldemort’s strange fixation on killing Jules.

“Thanks,” he made himself say, and Harry hovered for a few more seconds before he left. Jules thought he caught a glimpse of slit-pupiled eyes staring back at him from the door but he dismissed it as a trick of the mind. Harry _was_ a snake. But—Jules didn’t think he was lying.

They were brothers, after all. And they—this year, they’d made some progress. Had actual conversations, worked together. Harry was trying like he had been all along, and Jules had finally realized he should be trying too, and it was _working._ Nott and Greengrass had even been civil lately and Jules thought he might have misjudged them, that their awfulness all these years really had been protectiveness over Harry.

Well, Dad and Dumbledore might want Jules _safe_ and _protected_. They wanted to keep their figurehead hidden away until it was time to use him. Jules’ jaw clenched and he stared at the starry sky without seeing it.

In all his life, none of them had ever told him about this stupid prophecy. Jules had even _asked_ , several times after about eight when he started putting pieces together, why him. Dumbledore deflected. Always _not until you’re older_ or _when you’re ready_ until Jules just quit asking. Maybe he’d meant it, maybe he really did plan to tell Jules about the prophecy when Jules was some random age, but they didn’t have _time_ to wait anymore. Voldemort was back in his body, the Death Eaters had escaped, their whole world was threatened.

Jules had to find out the truth for himself if no adult was going to tell him. And apparently, the only person who’d be willing to help, the only one who’d tell him hard truths and not treat him like a child, was Harry.

_Harry_

_Aguamenti_ , Harry thought, slashing his wand. _Glacio._

The spray of water froze under Barty’s feet. He slipped, laughing. Shot off a _crucio_ and something Harry didn’t recognize. The first missed but the second connected, and felt like it set his right leg on fire.

Wincing, Harry returned with a hail of overpowered cutting curses, forcing Barty to shield while he laid one hand on his leg and poured wandless cooling magic into it. The curse could’ve been just a nerve thing that didn’t cause physical damage—it wasn’t the one that literally burned you up from inside, because Harry knew _incremo_ very well. This _should_ help.

It at least kept him functional.

Barty got enough time to conjure a solid block of stone instead of a magical shield. Harry Disillusioned himself instantly, even though the spell wasn’t perfect yet, and slid off to the side.

 _“Left,”_ Eriss said, and he went that way instantly, stepping around the left side of Barty’s conjured barrier just as his teacher stuck his head around the far edge.

_Consangui, decutex, stupef—_

Barty dove around the corner right after the blood-freezing curse hit him. Harry heard a choked noise. Instead of walking back around the edge, he conjured his own stone block, jumped on it, and poked his head over the original barrier.

A jet of red light hit him in the forehead.

He woke up on the floor. “My back is one giant bruise,” he complained.

“Then don’t go climbing on things until your Disillusionment Charm is better,” Barty said, busy vanishing the stone and repairing the room. “It was a clever idea but I’d already performed the counter to _consangui_.”

“Need a healing potion?” Harry said. Countercurses stopped the magic, and the one for _consangui_ also unfroze the blood, but it acted fast and the counter didn’t heal the damage.

Barty shook his head. “I’ll get one later, I got it off quickly enough. A Flaying Curse? Really?”

“You sent _decutex_ at me first,” Harry said.

“I didn’t anticipate you would be able to fire it back.” Barty left off his repair work and turned back, expression serious. “I’m not _angry_. Impressed, if anything. That one… takes intent.”

Harry knew exactly where he was going with this, but Barty was going to have to say it. He raised one eyebrow. “All magic is intent.”

“Some spells more than others,” Barty said. “That spell, for example, is considered only one tier below the Unforgivables. _That_ only because it’s physically damaging, not mentally.”

“Oops.”

Barty nodded, like he’d just confirmed something. “More extracurricular practice, I take it.”

“I’m usually doing some kind of extracurricular practice,” Harry said.

“You got around the wards, then?”

Harry shrugged.

Barty smirked at him. “In a certain… Chamber?”

“This school has lots of chambers,” Harry said, giving nothing away.

“My lord may have mentioned some of Slytherin’s safeguards,” Barty said. “I’m sure your Founder would be pleased to see an Heir using it so well.”

“I’m sure he would,” Harry agreed. “That it for today?”

“Yeah, I think we’re good.” Barty produced a book from his pocket. “Dueling techniques of the formal kind. I generally like to teach by forcing students to develop their own style and experience before having them study other people’s dueling styles. First three profiles by next week, and we’ll discuss similarities to and differences from how you and I duel.”

Harry nodded and slid the book into one of his own expanded pockets. Eriss returned to him from a corner and he had to stop himself wandlessly lifting her to his shoulders—Barty didn’t need to know about that little hidden ace just yet. Instead he bent down and collected her in his hands.

“Oh—almost forgot.” Barty fished a box out of his pocket. “Envelopes.”

The box went into the same pocket as the book. Harry had been facilitating communication between escaped Death Eaters and their children since the escape. None of them would be surprised to get an envelope slipped to them sometime over the next few days. He always staggered the handoffs, so they wouldn’t be able to pin down his off-grounds contact to any specific day of the week.

“See you next week,” Harry said.

Barty waved absently, already digging something else out of his pockets. Harry shook his head at the Ravenclaw’s busy mind and left the classroom.

He didn’t even bother with the Marauder’s Map anymore to get back to the common room. Eriss and the other snakes guided him, hissed instructions and warnings just barely reaching his ears from the shadows. Eriss’ control over the rest of the castle snakes had grown, something she was very proud of. Harry made a point to compliment her on it this evening, as he often did. She preened.

“Excited for the match this weekend?” Everett said when he got back to the common room.

“It shouldn’t be too dramatic,” Harry said with a shrug. “Gryffindor will have to beat Ravenclaw by at least sixty points to edge us out for House Cup and I don’t see that happening.”

“True that,” Peregrine agreed with an evil smirk. Celesta matched it. “Especially with the Weasley Terrors and the Git Who Lived gone.”

And they would have—if Ronald Weasley of _all_ people hadn’t suddenly discovered his previously dormant talent.

The new Beater, Kirke, fouled Draco. Hooch called it but McLaggen, the reserve Seeker, had already caught the Snitch and ended the game.

Harry only landed when his frustration had cooled enough for him to not curse someone.

On the bright side, Jules, Toby Pritchard, and Parvati were nowhere to be seen, so they couldn’t rub it in his face and make things worse.

June arrived, and with it, OWL fervor. Every Slytherin was relieved, even the fifth and seventh years, because exams distracted the Gryffindors from their tactless, unsubtle gloating. Harry alone of the Slytherin fifth years remained unaffected. He studied, of course, going back over old exams to make sure he knew the OWL-specific information, but most of his time was spent on Barty’s stuff. 

Snape sat the fifth and seventh years down on June 2. “As on the schedules you were given last week, you will begin tomorrow with your Theory of Charms exam,” he said in his characteristic icy sneer. “The written theoretical examinations will take place in the morning, and the practicals in the afternoon. I will warn you that the most stringent Anti-Cheating Charms have been applied to the exam papers, and Auto-Answer Quills, Remembralls, Detachable Cribbing Cuffs, and Self-Correcting Ink are banned from the examination hall.” He paused. “I have no doubt that some of you have already considered how you might get around those rules. I recommend that you not try. The risk is far higher than the reward, and should any of you be caught cheating, I will be most… _disappointed_.”

Several NEWT students made faces.

“Look,” Daphne hissed, elbowing Harry, “ _it’s the examiners.”_

“Ow,” he complained.

She glared at him.

“Of course, it’s all who you know,” he could hear Draco saying behind them, just loud enough for Ronald, Patil, and Jules to hear. “Mother’s been friends with the head of the Wizarding Examinations Authority for years—Griselda Marchbanks—we’ve had her ‘round for dinner and everything…”

“Hope you can put in a word for me, then,” Justin said. Harry bit back a smirk.

Draco and Justin caught up to them in the entrance hall, the former smirking and the latter grinning.

“I see you have an accomplice now,” Neville said, slinging an arm around Draco’s shoulders.

Draco shoved him off with a scowl.

Neville just grinned. “Funny you should say that, actually, ‘cause Griselda is friends with Gran and she’s never mentioned your family.”

“I know,” Draco said. “I just like pulling the Gryffindors’ tails.”

“They have it coming,” Neville agreed, waving at a short witch yelling at Umbridge. She waggled her fingers in his direction.

“They’re talking about Dumbledore,” said Pansy, who’d been ignoring the rest of them and eavesdropping. “C’mon.”

Harry let her work their whole group through the crowded entrance hall toward the examiners. Most of them were older and crusty-looking, the sorts of people you’d expect to have ink stains on their fingers and quills jammed in their unstyled hair. Also, kneazle hair on their robes.

“Have you heard from Dumbledore recently?” Umbridge simpered as Harry got closer. “I understand the two of you are acquaintances.”

“No, no, haven’t heard from him,” Madam Marchbanks practically shouted. _“She’s hard of hearing_ ,” Neville whispered. “No idea where he is, I suppose?” the old lady added, peering around the entrance hall as though he might spring from a broom cupboard.

“None at all,” Umbridge said, with a malevolent look in the Gryffindors’ direction. Ronald was pretending to do up his shoelace like there weren’t four different charms for that. “But I daresay the Ministry of Magic will track him down soon enough…”

“I doubt it,” shouted tiny Madam Marchbanks, “not if Dumbledore doesn’t want to be found! I should know… examined him personally in Transfiguration and Charms when he did NEWTs… did things with a wand I’d never seen before…”

“Yes, well,” Umbridge said stiffly, “allow me to show you to the staffroom for a cup of tea?”

Justin’s mouth was open slightly as Umbridge led them away. “She examined Dumbledore? How old _is_ she?”

“Old,” Neville said simply.

That evening, Ginny got a standing ovation for selling her brother dried doxy droppings with the lie it was powdered dragon claw nicked from an older Slytherin. Hermione wrote in the journals that she confiscated it before any harm was done but she admitted that she’d considered letting him eat it.

None of the fifth or seventh years talked much the next morning. Blaise was reading _Achievements in Charming_ over his toast, Daphne mumbled incantations under her breath, and the seventh years relentlessly quizzed each other at their end of the table. All the Slytherins picked up on their intensity and the whole table’s mood was serious and focused. The Ravenclaws were worse—half their table was asleep in their breakfasts and the other half were either reading or debating loudly on topics ranging from complex spell theory to who had worse bags under their eyes. A sort of frantic nervousness emanated from the Gryffindor table; only the Hufflepuffs seemed calm. Justin waved cheerfully at Harry’s section of the Slytherin table when he came in.

“I hate him,” Draco muttered.

Theo squinted in his direction. “Is that your second cup of coffee?”

“Shut it, Nott, I know for a fact you’re on your third,” Draco snarled.

Harry grinned into his tea.

They milled about in the entrance hall after breakfast until everyone else had gone to lessons. Finally, at half past nine, they were called back in.

The four House tables had been replaced with dozens of single tables, each bearing a plain brownish quill, an inkwell, and a packet of parchment turned face-down. Professor McGonagall waited sternly at the staff-table end of the Hall while they sat down facing her.

Harry would never admit it but he _was_ a little nervous. He knew he was ridiculously overprepared for this exam—but still.

“You may begin,” she said when they were all quiet, and turned over a massive hourglass.

With a quiet breath, Harry flipped over the booklet.

  1. _a) Give the incantation and b) describe the wand movement required for levitation._



His nerves melted away. A few rows ahead, Hermione and Theo were already scribbling; Ernie Macmillan alternated between staring at Hermione’s frantic writing speed and trying to beat it.

Harry started to write.

Hermione barricaded herself in an abandoned classroom as soon as they got out, two hours later, and grimly started reconstructing the entire exam. Daphne just sighed, conjured a chair, and waited outside while she practiced various charms. Theo, Neville, and Harry found them after leaving Blaise and Pansy and Draco to a heated argument over Cheering Charms and wordlessly joined in the practice.

After lunch was the practical. They were called into the Great Hall in groups of four students by last name. Harry put his back to a corner so none of the frantically practicing students could accidentally poke him in the back or eye like they kept doing to each other. Macmillan came over at one point, probably to badger Harry about his study schedule like he’d been doing everyone else, but Theo and Harry glowered in unison until he went away.

Hermione’s hands were shaking as they waited, and Daphne touched her shoulder lightly at a moment when almost no one was paying attention. Harry saw it because he and Pansy were both looking at Draco look at Hermione.

“How sweet,” Pansy said, quiet and mocking.

Blaise followed her gaze, then elbowed her. “Jealous.”

Pansy sniffed. “Hardly. I would never begrudge them their friendship.”

“Yes, you would,” Draco and Justin said in unison.

Neville laughed.

The group’s attention shifted to reviewing Color Charms. Only Harry seemed to notice that Pansy was sitting it out and looking a little pale. Wandwork wasn’t her strong suit.

“You’ll be fine,” he said quietly. “These exams are designed so that if you nail the theory part, you have some leeway on the practical, and I know you know charms theory.”

“ _I_ know, too,” Pansy hissed. “Doesn’t make it _easier._ ”

Harry grinned. “There’s the Pansy we all know and love. No Dark Arts in the exam, now.”

She returned an expression that was not at all reassuring.

“Black, Hadrian” was called early, right after Jessica Banderas. “Good luck,” Blaise murmured. “Not that you need it.”

“See you on the other side,” Harry said with a fake-flirty wave. He’d be the first of their group to head in, with Banderas, Susan Bones, and Lavender Brown.

Harry walked into the Great Hall already twirling his ash wand around his fingers.

“Professor Tofty is free, Mr. Black,” squeaked Professor Flitwick, just inside the door. He pointed Harry toward the oldest and baldest examiner, in the far corner next to Madam Marchbanks.

“Black, is it?” Tofty said, examining Harry under fluffy flyaway eyebrows. “The estranged Potter?”

Harry caught a badly concealed snigger from one of the students behind him and resisted the urge to make a comment about the eyebrows. “Yes, sir.”

“Very well. Now, if you could just take this teacup and make it do a few cartwheels for me…” he said encouragingly.

He’d always intended to do his best on the exam, but Harry never liked being talked down to and he took a special delight in outperforming every task. The teacup did five perfect cartwheels and then a back handspring for good measure; his Levitation Charm was performed in silence and the wine glass he was levitating stayed perfectly steady; his _reparo_ charm was cast verbally but otherwise perfect so he didn’t seem _too_ good; his Color-Change Charm sent his rat through a timed series of shades. Tofty sent him off with wide eyes and a whispered promise of _“excellent_ marks.”

Transfiguration had always promised to be one of the hardest OWLs. It didn’t disappoint. There were just so many little theoretical nuances and definitions, and Harry had studied so much that he found himself struggling to recall relatively simple things like the technical definition of a Switching Spell. He left confident that he’d gotten an O, of course, but not sure if it would break any school records, which he _very much_ wanted to do. Especially given whose name was on the OWL high score trophy at the moment.

If Riddle had a problem with Harry beating his scores, he could shove it off a cliff somewhere.

At least the Transfiguration practical went off without a hitch.

Herbology was the least interesting of all their exams. Harry liked studying magical plants and their properties, but not so much their care, and he almost got bitten by a Fanged Geranium. Only Neville and Theo were perfectly happy after that exam, spelling dirt off their robes and talking about Chinese Chomping Cabbage.

During the Defense exam, every single member of the DA and the Vipers gleefully watched Umbridge get redder and redder as they performed every jinx, counterjinx, and defensive spell they were assigned. Almost no one had a hundred percent success rate, but they did significantly better than could be expected given they hadn’t had any practical experience in class all year.

“Oh bravo!” cried Tofty, who’d made a point of examining Harry as often as possible since Charms. This was in response to a perfect boggart-banishing spell. “Very good indeed! I think that’s all, Mr. Black… unless…”

“Yes?” Harry said.

Tofty leaned forward. “I hear you can produce a corporeal Patronus?”

“I can, yes,” Harry said, carefully keeping his smirk hidden. This would _definitely_ get him extra credit and it was nice to know he had a bit of a reputation spreading already.

“If you would, then…? For a bonus point?” Tofty said with a conspiratorial wink.

Harry raised his wand and concentrated. _“Expecto patronum!”_

A silver wolf exploded out of his wand and loped a circle around the Great Hall. Everyone stopped to watch. It came to rest at Harry’s feet, looking around with interest.

“Excellent!” Tofty cried, clapping his hands. “Most excellent, Black.”

“Thank you, sir. May I release it?” Harry said, gesturing toward the wolf.

“Release…”

“It won’t disappear until I end the connection, but I can’t maintain it forever,” Harry said, with a fake-joking smile on his face. Humor connected people.

Tofty blinked. “Oh, of course.”

Harry neatly severed the flow of magic and his Patronus faded away. He slid his wand back into its holster.

“Impressive control,” Tofty muttered, scribbling on his parchment. “Very well, Black, you may go.”

“Good day, sir,” Harry said, bowing neatly.

On the way out, he spotted several other Vipers turning on their examiners with a question, and a burst of silver came from Justin’s station right before Harry left the Hall. He smiled at Umbridge on the way out.

She scowled back.

Friday was the Ancient Runes exam. Tofty wasn’t there, but a witch who vaguely resembled an ancient but still functional battleaxe tested Harry on the practical, which was a much simpler task than some of the runes-based exercises Barty had set him. “Full marks,” she whispered to him with a wink at the end of it. Babbling cheerfully waved to him on his way out of the Great Hall.

By mutual agreement, Harry’s fifth-year friends all took Saturday morning off, lazing about by the Black Lake with food from the kitchens and taking turns creating light shows with their wands. After lunch, though, they were back at it, cracking years of stained Potions textbooks and quizzing each other on recipes, ingredients, laws, and principles. Harry’s stack of books was twice as high as anyone else’s, and he had random students from all four Houses come up and ask him questions in the library. Mostly he answered correctly, since them scoring well wouldn’t hurt him, although Macmillan and a few others got misleading answers that left Theo hiding laughter behind his own books.

The exam on Monday was a breeze. Harry handed his modified Fatiguing Infusion in and listened to a Madam Hawthorne exclaim about it for ten minutes before she finally let him leave.

Tuesday was Arithmancy, the second-hardest exam for Harry, and Wednesday morning they sat the written Astronomy section. “Can you believe Weasley forgot about _Pluto?”_ Pansy said gleefully that afternoon.

“How do you know that?” Blaise said.

Pansy smiled.

“Why do you even bother asking at this point?” Theo said, slinging an arm around Pansy’s shoulders. She promptly squirmed away. As his other arm was already wrapped around Hermione, all three of them got yanked to the side before Pansy got free, laughing.

Hermione poked Theo in the ribs and he yelped.

“Wait,” Neville said. “Are you _ticklish?”_

Theo scowled. “No.”

“He’s normally a better liar than that,” Justin said, setting aside a star chart from January with an evil glint in his eye.

“I’m not ticklish,” Theo insisted.

Justin, Hermione, and Pansy made eye contact before all three of them dived on Theo at once.

“Yeah, he’s ticklish,” Harry said over Theo’s shrieks.

_Neville_

Mr. Tofty and Madam Griselda oversaw the Astronomy practical that evening. Neville blearily set up his telescope, quill, and inkwell. All they had to do was fill in as much of their star chart as possible, which wasn’t the hardest thing ever as two of their four Astronomy classes per month were spent doing exactly that, but it was a lot of rote memorization. Painfully boring like most of his exams. Although it had been really, really fun to whizz through the Defense one.

He grinned again, just remembering the look on Umbridge’s face when he cast a Patronus and a giant silver bear exploded into the Great Hall. Five people had screamed. _You can suck it, Umbridge. Uncle Algie too._

He was filling in Canis Major with a slight smile when, far below, light suddenly spilled over the lawn. Several students along his edge of the tower paused to look. Six people set off across the lawn. He recognized one.

There could be no good reason Umbridge wanted to take a stroll at midnight accompanied by five others. Neville frowned at them for a few seconds, but then someone coughed and he remembered with a jolt that he was in the middle of an exam.

He was just inking Venus’ trajectory onto his chart when a faint booming bark echoed up to the tower.

Fang.

No no no no. He _knew_ he should’ve stopped Lee putting that second niffler into Umbridge’s office, but without the twins around he and Hermione never got advance notice of Lee and his best friend Marisa’s pranks—

Neville looked around on instinct. Harry was already looking back from the other side of the tower; he couldn’t see what was going on but he was frowning already. Neville did his best to telegraph his panic.

Harry’s eyes flicked to the far side of the tower and his expression changed subtly.

Down below, Hagrid’s door opened. Six tiny but sharply defined figures walked inside. The door shut again.

Nerves churned in Neville’s stomach worse even than before the Potions exam.

Harry raised an eyebrow a fraction of an inch. Neville shrugged jerkily. He couldn’t say anything—didn’t know what was going on, even—

Madam Griselda coughed pointedly, and he jammed his eye back to his telescope again.

He stared at the moon even though he’d marked its position as soon as he started.

A distant roar jerked him away from it less than a minute later. Several people said “Ouch!” as they poked themselves with their telescopes trying to look down at Hagrid’s hut.

Hagrid’s door burst open with a _bang_ that he heard clearly even from this distance. The light flooding out of his cabin showed seven people clearly; the six looked like ants around Hagrid’s big frame. Jets of red light bounced off him from all directions. Neville clutched the edge of the parapet as Hagrid roared and spun and swung at them. _Yes_ , he willed, _fight back._

No one was paying attention to their tests. Tofty was yelling at them to get back to their examination but even the kids on the far side of the tower had left off what they were doing and crowded around to look. Harry elbowed his way into the mess by Neville, Hermione and Theo and Blaise right with him, and Neville managed to relax just a little bit.

“Be reasonable, Hagrid!” someone yelled distantly.

“Reasonable be damned, Dawlish, yeh won’ take me like this!” Hagrid bellowed.

 _“Take him?”_ Hermione hissed angrily. Her hair was so bushy it brushed Neville’s shoulder. He clenched his fists and she wrapped an arm around him without looking. “Take him _where_?”

Fang was leaping around Hagrid. Neville had never seen the gentle slobbery boarhound move quickly unless he was running from something, but now he was a blur of motion, and his snarls were faintly audible in between the humans’ shouts. Until a spell caught his ribs and threw him to the ground in silence.

“No,” someone gasped.

Hagrid roared in fury, lifted the culprit in one hand, and _threw_ him. All the fifth years gasped and a few screamed as the wizard flew what looked like ten feet. Neville’s stomach felt weird. He’d never seen Hagrid in a real temper before. They all knew his giant blood made him strong, large, and spell-resistant, but this…

Another person threw open the front doors and sprinted down across the lawn. “How dare you!” the figure shrieked. “How _dare_ you!”

“McGonagall!” Hermione gasped.

“Oh no,” Blaise muttered.

“Leave him alone! _Alone_ , I say! On what grounds are you attacking him?”

“Go, McGonagall, go!” Justin whisper-cheered.

“He has done nothing, _nothing_ to warrant such—”

This time it sounded like everyone screamed as six red streaks hit McGonagall in the chest at the same time.

Neville’s lungs stopped working as McGonagall flew right off her feet and then slammed down on the ground on her back. Even _Harry_ made a shocked, furious noise.

“Galloping gargoyles!” shouted Tofty, who no longer seemed to care about the exam. “Not so much as a warning! Outrageous behavior!”

“COWARDS!” Hagrid bellowed, his voice carrying clearly to them. “HAVE SOME O’ THAT—AN’ THAT—”

“Damn,” Daphne said, as Hagrid took two massive swipes and sent another two attackers flying. Then he doubled over and for a second Neville thought Umbridge switched to nastier spells—but he stood up again with Fang draped around his shoulders, and turned around, and bolted.

“Get him, get him!” Umbridge shrieked, but her lackeys hovered. One of them actually backed up so fast he tripped and fell over. Umbridge herself sent another Stunner after Hagrid, but it went wide and he vanished into the forest.

There was a long minute’s quivering silence.

“Only… only six more minutes…” Tofty said weakly.

The rest of the exam was a blur.

_Jules_

“Well, that was horrible,” Ron said. “I couldn’t remember anything about Lichtenstein and the ICW, could you?”

“ _Honestly_ , Ronald, it’s not that complicated,” Hermione snarled, stomping up the stairs near them. “That’s one of the biggest events in the history of our world, you’d think you’d know about it!”

“Yeah, well, not all of us are freaky swots, okay, why don’t you go hang out with your Slytherin cronies,” Ron grumbled.

Jules rubbed his throbbing right eye.

“Leave off, Ron,” Neville snapped. When had he grown a spine? Why couldn’t things be easy like they used to? “She actually _studied_.”

“I studied!”

Hermione scoffed. “This _morning!”_

“Enough, Hermione,” Parvati hissed.

Neville latched on to Hermione’s elbow and dragged her onto a different moving staircase.

“Thank Circe,” Parvati sniffed. “Here’s hoping they sit somewhere in the common room _not_ near us. Jules? Jules, are you okay?”

“Yeah, fine,” he said absently. No, no he _wasn’t_ fine, not in the slightest. He felt like a potion two degrees from boiling over.

“…okay,” Parvati said. “Well. Padma and Jessica wanted to ask me some questions about the exam, I think, so I’m going to pop over to the base of their tower for a bit. Catch you later?”

“Sure,” Jules said.

Parvati pecked Ron on the cheek and hopped onto a different staircase. Jules was mildly surprised to realize he wasn’t jealous of that.

Maybe he was just too tied up in what was happening tonight for jealousy.

“Okay, what’s really up, mate?” Ron said. “I know you, something’s wrong.”

Jules looked around. “In here.”

He dragged Ron into one of several little side landings in Gryffindor Tower. The bottom few floors of the Tower were hollow and full of the moving staircases, lined with portraits; only the top two-thirds of it held the common room and dorms. They’d just look like they got stuck on a landing waiting for a staircase to come get them.

Jules cast a spell to deafen the portraits around them. “Look, I need to tell you something,” he said, and in a hurried whisper he relayed the Order meeting from a few weeks ago when they first came up with the Tonks-impersonate-Jules plan, his talk with Harry, the idea of a prophecy, and how the adults were keeping secrets to protect him.

Ron’s eyes were huge by the end of it, freckles standing out almost like blood with how pale he’d gotten. “Jules. That’s… some serious stuff.”

“I know,” Jules said. “I know. And—it’s all on me, all of this, I can’t have Tonks go out there as me! They’ll be trying to _kill her_. Plus I _have to know_. I can’t just keep sitting back and—and letting them plan everything. I’m too old to just trust that all the adults in my life know best.” He broke off and ground the heels of his hands into his eyes. “Dad and Dumbledore—they’re my heroes but they’ve… they can fuck up. I mean, they did with Sirius, and if they hadn’t—hadn’t put him away then… maybe he’d have taken Harry in and stayed friends with Dad and we wouldn’t be in this mess, who knows, but I have to go, okay? I have to get that prophecy. I have to know what it—I have to _know_.”

“Yeah,” Ron said, nodding. He still looked shaky but his hands were fists. “Yeah. Okay. So when do we leave?”

Jules’ heart contracted suddenly, painfully. “Just me,” he said. “Just me.”

“ _What?”_ Ron yelped. “You—can’t be serious, mate, bloody fuck, it’s a mess in there! You need backup!”

“I have the whole Order,” Jules said, crossing his arms. “I’m _not_ putting you at risk, too, okay? Forget it. _I_ shouldn’t even be there, and I’m the Boy Who Lived.”

Ron rolled his eyes. “Like anyone could ever forget.”

Jules brushed that off. “Look, I need your help, okay? Tonks is coming after dinner. She can’t impersonate me at the table, not well enough to fool Parvati and Toby and Lav and everyone who knows me—so we’re doing the swap before the Ministry people come pick me up. Dad’s meeting her in the Atrium. The rest of the Order will be inside.” He reached out and gripped Ron’s shoulders. “Ron, listen. You’re the only one I’m trusting with this, okay? _I need you.”_

For a second, their eyes met, and Jules could suddenly see what Hermione pointed out last year. He’d taken her word for it but until now he never picked it out himself. The weight of jealousy lay heavy on Ron’s shoulders—always coming behind his brothers, and then being the Boy Who Lived’s best mate…

Jules was the Boy Who Lived and he could never change that, never separate that from himself, but he could have friends _too._ Be a better friend than he had, anyway, when they were kids and he was blind.

“Yeah, you do,” Ron said, cracking a smile. “Dunno where you’d be without me, mate.”

“Suffering through Trelawney’s bullshit alone,” Jules said, grinning back. More out of relief than anything else.

Ron laughed. It was a little strained but mostly real. “Merlin’s balls, that exam was bad… but we never have to take it again. I don’t care if my tea leaves spell _die, Ron, die_ , I’m chucking them in the bin where they belong.”

“And I don’t care if Uranus and Saturn join hands and dance the cancan over Potter Manor, Trelawney can stress over that,” Jules said.

“So what’s the plan?” Ron said.

“All right.” Jules took a breath. He had to be careful about his oath here. “I’m pretty sure we’re not the only ones who’ve figured out communication methods like our little papers for the DA. I need you to slip to the Slytherins that they’re planning to swap me out with a double. Not _who_ , ‘cause that’d put Tonks in danger again, but that it’s happening after dinner. They’ll do something so I can’t make the swap.” He swallowed. “They’ll… Dumbledore will... send me anyway. He needs to—draw out Voldemort. He’ll use me as bait if I force it.”

Ron frowned. “You’re sure about this?”

“As sure as I’ve ever been about anything,” Jules said. “Except maybe flying.”

“All right, then. Let’s go pretend to let Crabbe eavesdrop on us,” Ron said.


End file.
